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THE CALL 

of 

A WORLD TASK 

IN WAR TIME 



BY 

J/ LovELL Murray 

Educational Secretary 
Student Volunteer Movement 



REVISED EDITION 



NEW YORK 

STUDENT VOLUNTEER MOVEMENT 

1918 






Copyright, 19 i8, by 

STUDENT VOLUNTEER MOVEMENT 

FOR FOREIGN MISSIONS 



NOV 30I9J8 

O Gl. A 5 8 8 7 9 

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PREFACE 

These studies have been prepared as part of the ad- 
vance missionary program which emanated from the 
Student Volunteer Conference held at Northfield, 
Mass., January 3-6, 1918. It was felt by leaders of the 
Student Christian Movements in the United States and 
Canada that accompanying a call to the students of 
these nations for intensified missionary undertakings 
in this college year there should be the promise of 
a new course of study interpreting the present world 
situation in terms of missionary responsibility. It was 
with much reluctance that the writer consented to pre- 
pare a book within the brief compass of a month on 
so immense and important a subject. The haste with 
which it has been written will account in part for its 
obvious limitations of material and style. For those 
who will use this book as a textbook for group study 
there have been added Questions for Thought and Dis- 
cussion and Suggestions for Auxiliary Reading. 

J. L.M. 

New York, February 9, 1918. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction . . vii 

I 
The Call for Reality in Religious Life . 1 

II 
The Call for a Christian Internationalism 27 

III 
The Call of New Opportunities ... 61 

IV 
The Call of the World's Present Need . 93 

V 

The Call for a World Program in the 

Church 130 

VI 

The Call for a Full Mobilization of Chris- 
tian Forces 163 

Questions for Thought and Discussion . . 197 
Suggestions for Auxiliary Reading . . . 207 

APPENDICES 

A. Some Prayers for Use in Wartime . . 208 

B. The Challenge of the War, to Foreign 

Missions 212 



INTRODUCTION 

TO THE THIRD (rEVISED) EDITION^ 

In the months that have intervened since the first edi- 
tion of this book was printed there has been develop- 
ing in AlUed countries a clearer discernment of the 
issues at stake in the War. This has been due partly 
to processes of education and partly to historical de- 
velopments. The selfishness, brutality and perfidy of 
the German military command have startlingly been 
made manifest and their secret purposes have been un- 
masked. This has been true most notably in their 
shameless treatment of Russia and Roumania. Among 
the nations linked with Germany there has come as a 
result a lack of confidence and unity. On the other 
hand, among the Allies has come a new unity based on 
a new recognition of the utter necessity of winning the 
War if the world is to be saved from militarism and the 
rule of force and saved to righteousness and democ- 
racy and peace. The altruistic and noble aims of the 
Allied cause have become clarified and have gained in 
fervid acceptance by the individual citizen. In the last 
hamlet of our lands it is being realized that every man 
and woman of us must stand up and be counted as a 
zealous, unsparing champion of the rights of humanity. 

vii 



viii INTRODUCTION 

In other words, gradually it is being recognized that 
merely winning battles, even the last battle, and render- 
ing Prussianism impotent may not spell real victory 
for our cause. The extinction of Prussian militarism 
is only incidental to the supreme end for which we are 
fighting, namely, the development of a new interna- 
tional spirit, a spirit of respect, cooperation and good 
will that will fully observe the Golden Rule among 
nations. 

We must fortify ourselves with this great convic- 
tion, for ahead of us lie stress and strain and increas- 
ing losses. The toll of death will grow longer and the 
sacrifices we must all bear will be heavier as the weeks 
pass by. We must know that the price is none too 
great to pay. We must be convinced in our souls 
that only by going on to the end, the most bitter end, 
can we make all the past progress of humanity a suc- 
cess, ensure that the utmost sacrifices of these present 
desperate years are not in vain and guarantee that the 
generations unborn will be immensely benefited. 

We are seeing more clearly than ever that at its 
root this world conflict is the clash of two opposite 
principles, the principles of materialism and spiritual- 
ity, of brute force and good- will. And back of that it 
is the clash of two opposite conceptions of God — on 
the one hand as Thor, on the other hand as God, the 
loving Father. That is it. There lie our satisfaction 
and our hope amid all the pain and darkness of these 
evil hours. We are fighting for God, for the Fatherly 
God, for the God of Jesus Christ. 

iFrom this point of view, the impression is ever deep- 



INTRODUCTION ix 

ening that ultimately this is not a war between this 
group of nations and that group of nations but between 
good and evil. Whatever may be said about war in 
general, the conviction is steadily taking hold that this 
War, so far as we are concerned, is not a condemna- 
tion but a vindication of the religion of Jesus Christ. 
It is the expression of a vital, victorious Christianity. 

So we are seeing that Christ is the only solution of 
the world's problem and the only hope of world de- 
mocracy. He must be proclaimed to the nations. De- 
mocracy can be firmly established only where His spirit 
and teachings have been accepted. Therefore the 
spreading of His doctrine in the world is not one thing 
and the struggle against autocracy and militarism an- 
other. They are two aspects of one great undertaking 
and they are both urgently necessary. One is the 
planting of fruitful seeds, the other the uprooting of 
noxious weeds. We must fight to destroy these abom- 
inable growths. Equally and quite as urgently must 
we scatter broadcast the life-giving principles of lib- 
erty, of the infinite worth and inalienable rights of 
every individual child of God. 

More than ever therefore we are led to recognize 
now the international obligations of Christianity in 
order that we may faithfully fulfil them in the days that 
will follow the War. It is with these obligations as 
revealed and intensified by the War that this book is 
concerned. It makes no attempt to analyze the im- 
mediate causes of the conflict which with savage pre- 
meditation the Prussian military machine thrust upon 
the world. Nor does it argue the justice of the Allies' 



X INTRODUCTION 

position. It takes this position for granted as being 
essentially righteous and Christian. It does attempt 
an inquiry into certain great constructive processes 
whereby Qiristianity not only can vindicate itself in 
international life but also can make good the winning 
of the War by preparing even in the least favored na- 
tions a safe dwelling place for Christian world democ- 
racy. The discussion of a thorough internationalizing 
of our Christianity begins with the second chapter. 

The first chapter treats of a question of primary and 
fundamental importance to the rest of the book. 
The great nations of Asia and Africa are now vivid 
on our maps as never before. Nearly all of the citi- 
zens of those nations are our allies. Their populations 
comprise the majority of the people in the world. 
Their possibilities are beyond our imagining. Not only 
are they in the field of our war purposes as nations 
entitled to free democratic development, but some of 
the greatest of them are today facing acute problems 
of democracy. They are giving us their help. We 
have before us the amazing spectacle of non-Christian 
nations fighting for distinctively Christian principles. 
And they need our help. Most of all they need in 
their national life the ferment of the ideals of Jesus 
Christ. 

If it is granted that the only condition in which a 
true democracy can flourish is a condition of essential 
Christianity, the first lesson of all which the War 
brings to Christian men and women is the necessity of 
making sure that the Christianity which we spread 



INTRODUCTION xi 

among the nations is the real Christianity of democ- 
racy, the pure Christianity of Jesus Christ Himself. 

Indeed all of the deeper questions that the War will 
leave with us lead back to fundamental questions of 
religion, to the quality of our Christianity. How are 
the losses of the War to be overtaken and the tasks 
of reconstruction performed ? How may the gains of 
the War be held secure? How is peace to be made 
permanent? What international instrumentalities will 
safeguard the free development of nations ? How may 
we hold the full benefits of nationalism while building 
up a new internationalism? How are we to perfect 
our own dem'ocracy, rid it of any taint of Prussianism 
and secure complete rights for all classes in our popu- 
lation? These are immense and difficult problems. 
But back of them all is the problem of human char- 
acter and will, of the development of a new manhood 
and womanhood. Christian ideals must be made reg- 
nant in individual life. 

The fundamental question therefore with which we 
must begin this study is that of the reality of our own 
religion. 



THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 
IN WAR TIME 

CHAPTER I 

THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGIOUS LIFE 

What are we fighting for? Surely not for the mere 
winning of battles. These are but the means to 
mightier ends. After the last destruction of battle the 
more difficult task of construction will have to be 
undertaken. We shall not be content to rebuild ac- 
cording to the old order but according to a finer plan. 
It is for this better plan we are fighting. It has been 
described in many elaborate ways but in a word what 
we are fighting for is a Christian world democracy. 

We know now that we must have a world democracy 
or none at all. Democracy has once and forever 
passed all national limitations. 

Also we know now that we must have a truly Chris- 
tian democracy or none at all. Jesus Christ and de- 
mocracy go hand in hand. If a genuine democracy is to 
take hold of the life of the world, the spirit and teach- 
ings of Christ must be made known and applied to all 
localities of the world's life. This is fundamental to a 
successful program of world democracy. It is the 
premise on which these studies proceed. In them we 
are to consider the projection of the purposes and 

1 



2 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

ideals of essential, which is democratic, Christianity 

among all nations, seeking to discover some of the 

great lessons pertaining to this task which have been 

coming to us in war time. And foremost among the 

profound and urgent messages which God is uttering 

to His people in this awful hour, we hear His clarion 

call for reality in religion. To that call let us direct 

our first attention. 

Never before have the forces of righteousness been 

so thoroughly aroused to the necessity of fashioning 

an international order of justice and freedom and good 

will. And never has international idealism known 

such concerted action or made such rapid strides as 

in the past few years. But we are moving into the 

new world order through blood and fire. It was little 

more than yesterday that an influential New York 

daily wrote thus of the prospects of universal peace: 

It was nearer last year than it was the year before; it is 
nearer this year than it was last year ; it is nearer now, today, 
than it was on the first day of the present year, and, with an 
advancing step, that has never gone backward, through all 
these years, the prophecy is safe and beautiful that we are 
marching swiftly into the vast open of universal peace. 

That was three years before the War. How 
strangely the words fall on our ears today when over 
four-fifths of the world's population is at war.^ More 
than a score of nations are at one another's throats. 
Already the conflict has cost over $100,000,000,000. 
In six months the United States appropriated, or pro- 



* According to the Statesman's Year Book, the population of 
the world is estimated to be 1,691,751,000. The total popula- 
tion of the belligerent countries is 1,388,264,565. 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 3 

vid-ed taxation measures for, more than twenty bil- 
lions. According to the report of the Treasury at 
Washington on January 31, 1918, the United States 
was at that time spending $39,000,000 a day for War 
purposes, including $15,000,000 a day for loans to the 
Allies. This amounts to $1,625,000 every hour, or 
more than $450 a second. The outlay for direct war 
expenses keeps mounting steadily. The Government's 
original estimate for the fiscal year ending June 30, 
1918, called for over $18,000,000,000, or an average of 
$50,000,000 a day.^ 

But the cost in men is more staggering. Forty mil- 
lion men are under arms,^ away from their productiv-e 
pursuits and engaged actively in a fierce work of de- 
struction.^ Eight million three hundred thousand have 
laid down their lives, not including those who have 
died of disease nor the lives lost as a result of the 
War. Nearly 7,000,000 men are in prisoner-of-war 
camps. An equal number are in hospitals and it is 
estimated that about 2,500,000 are physically handi- 
capped for hfe. 

But, after all, figures convey little. They bewilder 
us and our minds are already numbed to the signifi- 
cance of millions and billions. But we do know what 
pain means and anxiety and bereavement and despair. 
These make up the tragedy of countless suffering lives 



* The twenty great wars of the last 125 years combined cost 
only $22,000,000,000. 

^Including the Russian army, now inactive. 

^ Never before were more than two million engaged in any 
war. 



4 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

and countless darkened homes. Habitations of men 
have beconie smoking ruins and vast areas that were 
gardens yesterday are deserts today. It is a day of 
horror and agony to great multitudes of men and 
v^omen and little children. And what of the morrow ? 
Small wonder that hope is running low in so many 
lives. With lessened resources and spent energies 
men, and women equally, must set themselves to the 
work of salvage and reconstruction.^ Dr. John R. Mott 
put it graphically in a recent address when he said of 
war-stricken countries, 'The curfew is going to ring 
late in these coming nights and the days of leisure 
will be few." 

Under the shadow of this dark tragedy the first 
thought that leaps to one's mind is the question. To 
what purpose is this loss? If it should prove to be 
only wast-e, that would be the great horror and tragedy 
of slW And we shall hold it to be waste if out of all 
the loss and suffering there does not issue a world 
order in which true principles of Christian democracy 
will prevail, an order in which right will be set above 
might, duty above privilege, cooperation above rivalry, 
the things of the spirit above material good, service 



^ Speaking before the Empire Club in Toronto, March 8th, 
1917, Professor A. B. Macallum, of the Advisory Research 
Council of Canada, said that the cost of the War "would 
impose on the world an annual charge of $500,000,000 for a 
century." 

^A trade review published in Chicago said in its issue of 
January 5th, 1918: "If a World War does not result in the 
substitution of Service for Self as the basis of human rela- 
tions its supreme benefit will have been lost." 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 5 

above selfishness, ministering above being ministered 
unto, an order in which nations will recognize the 
Golden Rule in their dealings with each other.^ 

Warfare has proved to be necessary. We could 
not escape the gloom of today if we are to find glory 
in tomorrow. But to bring about an international 
order such as this, war alone will not avail. There 
are already ruins enough on which to climb, but man- 
kind needs more than ruins to help it upward. And 
it needs more than numbers and wealth and strength 
and skill. We may mass our treasure and our men 
and win a thousand wars and still miss the prize. 
War in itself, however righteous the cause may be, 
is only destructive; at best it is a surgical process. 
The problem in its essence is a moral and religious one 
and it calls for something more than surgical treat- 
ment. 

The one positive factor needed is Jesus Christ. He 
alone can supply the upbuilding, redemptive, vitalizing 
force that will save human society. But He cannot 



* President Wilson's repeated insistence that what standards 
are accepted as binding between individuals should be recog- 
nized as binding between nations is to many a new and 
startling thought. Some one said the other day that we have 
been preaching the Golden Rule between individuals and 
Macchiavellism between nations. As recently as two years 
ago prominent Church leaders in the United States could be 
heard to declare that the Golden Rule was not practicable in 
international relations. Multitudes of Anglo-Saxon Chris- 
tians have been under the spell of the evil view that the Chris- 
tian law of love, to use Bernhardi's words, "can claim no 
significance for the relations of one country to knother, . . . 
Christian morality is personal and social and in its nature 
cannot be political." 



6 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

function except through His followers. He cannot 
conquer in the world if He is defeated in the lives of 
His individual disciples. Not on the fields of Flanders 
or Galicia or Mesopotaniia, but on the battlegrounds 
of men's hearts is raging the ultimate warfare of the 
hour. If the hands of Christ are tied today, so that 
He cannot transform the life of mankind, it is only 
because He does not find free instruments whereby 
He can do His supernatural, recreative work. It is 
not the profession but the fact of religion that is lack- 
ing. Let the religious life of those who name His 
name become a living, glowing reality and His miracles 
will multiply in the whole of human life. 

To learn this greatest lesson of the hour we must 
give ourselves first to introspection and then to action. 
We must face steadily and humbly the disclosures of 
religious weakness which the War has made and we 
must set ourselves resolutely to overcome this weak- 
ness. The call to reality which is sounding out today 
above the clash of the world's armies is therefore a 
twofold summons. 

I. A Summons to Penitent Recognition that there 
has been Something Amiss with Christian CivilizO' 
tion. 

Very evidently there has been !n Christian civiliza- 
tion some deep-seated and penetrative disease. The 
real evil is not the war, but what lies back of it. Are 
we not justified in believing that the disease is of the 
nature of a malignant growth which the fires of war 
may help to sear and destroy? At all events, the war 
is a symptom and like other symptoms may be reck- 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 7 

oned of great advantage in betraying the disease and 
locating its nature and its causes. 

We cannot ignore the fact that this is a war of so- 
called Christendom. One so-called^ Christian nation 
instigated a second Christian nation to pick a quarrel 
with a third Christian nation and refuse reasonable 
amends. This led a fourth Christian nation to mobilize 
its forces, whereupon Christian nation number one de- 
clared war. The result was that a fifth Christian na- 
tion became a belligerent. When a sixth Christian 
nation had its rights shamelessly violated, forcing it 
into a state of war, there seemed to be no escape for 
a seventh Christian nation's entering the conflict. And 
so it went on. Of the twenty-three nations now en- 
gaged in the struggle, only four are called non-Chris- 
tian. In that sense this is Christendom's war. More- 
over, the line of cleavage runs through all of the main 
divisions of Christianity. Before the United States 
and Roumania entered the war, forty-six million Prot- 
estants were arrayed on one side, forty-five million on 
the other. Sixty-two million Roman Catholics were 
fighting against sixty-three millions of the same 
Church. The Greek Catholics were not so evenly di- 
vided, but they were on both sides of the encounter. 

1. As Christian nations we are partners in the 
sins that so sharply antagonized us one against the 
other and that at last ran their shears through the 



1 Many people now protest against the use of the term 
"Christian nation." The term is used here and elsewhere in 
these pages in the usual acceptance of the term and in full 
recognition that no nation has yet justified its right to the title. 



8 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

fabric of international society. We may of course 
justly claim that we are not equally sinners. Just as 
we may take reasonable pride that in our conduct of 
the war we and our allies liave not been guilty of the 
unspeakable horrors that have stained the banners of 
our enemies, so we may honestly allege that there is 
wide disparity between our share and theirs in those 
faults that deeply underlie the War. But we should 
frankly acknowledge that some degree of wrong lies 
at every national door and that the sins of material- 
ism, selfishness, pride and social injustice which are 
behind the War are common to all the Christian 
nations. 

2. As Qiristian nations we are all at fault in per- 
mitting war to survive on the earth. We are not now 
appraising the motives or ideals that have carried the 
different nations into the present war. As for 
the Allied nations, dictates of honor and Christian 
duty demanded that they enter the struggle.^ We 
merely point now to the fact that in spite of the 
development of Christian civilization through the 
centuries Christian nations continue to resort, for the 



*Mr. G. Lowes Dickinson points out that one may con- 
sistently hold the view that war in itself is essentially evil 
and at the same time justify a "war for righteousness" as a 
necessary evil, to avoid a greater one. "The man who takes 
that view has apparently the ideal of peace, not of war. He 
wages war for the sake of peace. It is clear that there need 
be no war for Right unless some one had first made war for 
Wrong" — "The Choice Before Us," p. 58. Our present war- 
fare is for peace as well as for righteousness. 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 9 

settlement of conflicting interests, to so stupid and 
un-Christian and savage an instrumentality as War. 

The conscience against War in general has been de- 
veloping steadily and with good results within Chris- 
tian nations. Through righteous diplomacy, through 
treaties fairly made and honorably kept and through 
arbitration agreements, many differences have been 
peacefully compounded which in earlier times would 
have been hastily put to the arbitrament of the sword. 
At the same time gigantic military establishments have 
been developed and provision kept ready at hand for 
immediate warfare. 

3. As Christian nations we have common culpability 
in the spirit of hate which we have carried into our 
conduct of the War. There is a hot indignation 
against wrong that is not only innocent but holy. We 
refer here to sheer hatred of an enemy, which is 
something very different. 

The most Godlike thing among nations or individ- 
uals is love, the most Christlike thing is brotherliness. 
But how little of this feeling and attitude had been 
existing in the hearts of Christian people before the 
War became evident at once when war broke out. 
What a temper! Where is the new and all-compre- 
hensive commandment Christ gave, that Christians, in- 
cluding Christian nations, should love one another? 
It is forgotten in the "hymns of late" that Christians 
are addressing to each other across their national bor- 
ders. Listen to these words of a recently written 
German song: 



10 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

You will we hate with a lasting hate, 
We will never forego our hate, 
Hate by water and hate by land, 
Hate of head and hate of hand. 
Hate of the hammer and hate of the crown. 
Hate of seventy millions choking down. 
We love as one, we hate as one, 
We have one foe and one alone — 
ENGLAND! 

And a multitude of his countrymen join Lissauer in 
the refrain. It is said that recently in a German city 
3,000 people attended a lecture on "How to Hate Eng- 
land Most." But other Christian nations besides Ger- 
many know how to hate. M. Henri de Regnier, of 
France, found a wide response among his countrymen 
when, brooding over his country's wrongs, he wrote: 

I swear to cherish in my heart this hate 

Till my last heart-throb wanes; 
So may the sacred venom of my blood 

Mingle and charge my veins ! 

May there pass never from my darkened brow 

The furrows hate has worn! 
May they plough deeper in my flesh, to mark 

The outrage I have borne! 

By towns in flames, by my fair fields laid waste. 

By hostages undone, 
By cries of murdered women and of babes. 

By each dead warrior son 

I take my oath of hatred and of wrath 

Before God, and before 
The holy waters of the Marne and Aisne, 

Still ruddy with French gore; 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION H 

And fix my eyes upon immortal Rheims, 

Burning from nave to porch, 
Lest I forget, lest I forget who lit 

The sacrilegious torch I 

And a young Belgian poet writes in the same strain 
in his "New Year's Prayer": 

I pray that every passing hour 
Your hearts may bruise and beat, 
I pray that every step you take 
May scorch and sear your feet 

I pray that Beauty never more 

May charm your eyes, your ears. 

That you may march through day and night 

Beneath a heaven of tears. 

Blind to the humblest flowers that in 

The hedgerow corners bloom. 

Deaf to whatever sound or cry 

May wake in you the memory 

Of dear ones left at home 

I pray the spectres of our slain 
May haunt you in your tents — 
Vigil or sleep, whiche'er you seek — 
Nought smelling but the bloody reek 
Of our Holy Innocents. 

The translation into English is by Earl Curzon of 
Kedleston. Doubtless when it appeared there were 
many fervent Amens from the Earl's countrymen. 
For there have been profuse expressions of intense 
hatred of Britons towards Germany. The Archbishop 
of Canterbury says, "I get letters in which I am urged 
to see to it that we insist upon ^reprisals, swift, bloody 
and unrelenting. Let gutters run with German blood. 



12 iTHE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

Let us smash to pulp the German old men, women 
and children/ and so on."^ 

In France, in Belgium and even in Germany 
this spirit is far from being universal. There are 
many who decry all bitterness and hatred even in the 
most vigorous prosecution of warfare.^ But unfortu- 
nately it is a spirit that runs deep with great numbers 
of the people. And in the United States and Canada 
many a similar sentiment is heard, and the "cult of 
hate" gains adherents by the hour. There is nothing 
surprising in all this. For hatred is an active leaven 
in war time, and it is made part of the process of 
motivation for an energetic and widespread war spirit 
in the general public.^ 

How fervently we should pray that the wounds in 

1 Quoted by G. S. Eddy in "With Our Soldiers in France," 
page 165. 

2 For example, Mr. Jerome K. Jerome writes : "Our victory 
must be not only over Germans, but over ourselves. We must 
have no hatred, no bitterness. By no other means will peace 
be conclusive." 

3 There are encouraging signs of a growing sentiment 
against the development of a spirit of hatred in the public 
mind. Many soldiers are pledging themselves to carry out 
their share of the War without hate. 

A dispatch from Washington, dated February 3, 1918, re- 
ports that in the last issue of "The News Bulletin'* of the 
Four Minute Men, through which the American Govern- 
ment's 20,000 volunteer speakers are informed and instructed, 
there is a warning against the preaching of hate. "Hatred," 
it says, "has been stirred up in civilian populations in order 
to encourage enlistment, but thanks to the draft, this debas- 
ing feature of war is not necessary in order to secure and 
maintain our army." This is a most significant utterance. 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 13 

the body of mankind should heal clean, "by first in- 
tention," as Canon Gould of Toronto says, and that 
no self-righteous Or punitive spirit should "leave be- 
hind pockets of malignant germs which prevent heal- 
ing, and result in obstinate conditions of infection, 
the only cure for which is reopening and radical 
measures/* Surely these are times when every Chris- 
tian man and woman should live close to the Lord 
and Master of us all, close enough not only to hear 
His steady, persistent whispering, "Recompense to no 
man evil for evil. Love your enemies and pray for 
them that persecute you," but also to have communi- 
cated to us His own overcoming spirit of love. 

In facing these disclosures which have been made of 
common religious weakness in Christian nations, we 
are not concerned at this particular point to locate the 
blame for starting the War. The blame is great and 
is easily located. But the final question is religious, 
not political. Just as the rifle, according to musketry 
instructors, has improved out of all proportion to the 
man behind the rifle, so the material civilization 
of Christian nations has outrun its moral and spir- 
itual resources.^ As Dr. Mott says, "We are kill- 
ing men's bodies because in previous years we 
were killing men's souls. We are putting men 
under the sod because in earlier years we did not go 
to the root of motive and of conduct." Written 
across the dark tragedy of the hour is the plain, hard 
fact that our form of Christianity has been found 
wanting. It is the Christianity of Jesus Christ that 



'See pamphlet, "The Discipline," W. R. Maltby, page 9. 



14 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

must be substituted. Mr. J. H. Oldham, m his re- 
cent notable book, puts it pithily: "J^sus claimed to 
be the Way, the Truth and the Life. But Chris- 
tendom has made little serious attempt to order its 
national, social and industrial life in accordance with 
the way of Christ; there has been wanting a passions- 
ate, exultant conviction that in Him is to be found 
the truth regarding men's relations with one another ; 
we have not opened our hearts wide enough to the 
inflow of that divine life which has power to infuse 
health and vigour into the social order." ^ 

Nor are we concerned at the moment to defend 
Christianity against the charge that it has failed. Our 
brief, were we to do so, would be very simple, namely, 
that Christianity has never had a chance to fail in 
national or international relations, having never been 
fully tried. True, Christianity did not prevent the 
War, but should we abandon it on that account? Only 
if we abandon everything else that men had hoped 
was leading away from war — commerce, diplomacy, 
education, ethical culture, community of interest, in- 
ternational law, humanitarian spirit, and a host of 
other influences that were Operating between nations 
but that failed to prevent the War. No, we are going 
right ahead with our commerce and our education and 
our international sanctions and all the rest and we are 
going right ahead with our Christianity. 

Who will say that Christianity has failed, when it 
is now revealing itself as the one solution for the 
problem, the one cure for the disease? It is true that 

1 "The World and the Gospel," page 7. 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 15 

the religion of Jesus Christ was never more needed; 
but it is also true that its potencies were never more 
plain. What spirit is it that is protesting so vigor- 
ously against war and all those selfish, anti-social and 
materialistic factors in human society that produce 
wars, but the spirit of Christ? The rising tides of 
democracy, what are they but the mighty surging of 
His spirit who calls upon all men to stand together 
on one level and utter with Him those blessed and 
equalizing words, "Our Father"? The voices crying 
out for a new internationalism based on righteousness 
and service, what are they but the echo of His voice 
Who "did no sin, neither was guile found in His 
mouth," and Who at the last gave His flesh for the 
life of the world? It is Jesus Christ that the world 
needs to bind up its gaping wounds, to give hope to 
its burdened, sorrowful heart, and to control its life 
in purity and love. When He is lifted up, He will 
draw all men unto Him, to meet their individual re- 
quirements and to teach them how to live together in 
brotherly peace. He has not failed. Men have failed. 
As we realize our share in those corporate sins that 
lie behind the War, we should give ourselves to hu- 
miliation and confession before God. Nothing would 
end the awful conflict so quickly and satisfactorily and 
finally as that each Christian nation should recognize 
and repent of its faults of selfishness and hate, in what- 
ever degree they exist, and kneeling humbly at the 
altar of confession should find there the bowed and 
penitent heads of the other nations that are called by 
the name of the loving Christ. 



16 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

II. A Positive Summoiis to Let Our Religion 
Freely Express Itself in Both Thought and Life. 

If the first demand is for a penitent recognition of 
our share in the corporate sin of Christendom, the 
second demand is for amends. It is the aggressive 
side of the summons to reality. 

Whichever way religion faces, whether upon the in- 
dividual life, the life of the community or the life of 
the world, it is met today by the demand for reality. 

1. It is abundantly true that individual human lives 
are crying out for reality in the things of religion. 
This is an hour in which the souls of men are hard 
beset for certainties to which they can make fast. 
When the great storm broke upon the world, some 
found that a light anchor in yielding sand would not 
hold. And some found that they had been leaning 
against a sheltered dock but had never been moored. 
And now they are adrift on a turbulent sea. Their 
cry is pathetic for pilots who can bring them to a safe 
and sure anchorage. Those who held to doctrines 
because they were traditional, those who held to doc- 
trines because they were radical, those who held to 
doctrines because they fitted in with certain foregone 
hypotheses, have had their eyes opened. Not suppo- 
sitions, but certainties are demanded, not observances 
and dogmas, but realities. 

It is only to be expected that those men who are 
closest to the grimness and ugliness of the present 
world situation, and who often for weeks at a time 
are momentarily looking death in the face, should be 
foremost in their demand for reality in the religion 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 17 

that is presented to them. Mr. Sherwood Eddy mul- 
tipHes instances of this demand in his book, "With 
Our Soldiers in France," and other reHgious workers 
among the troops corroborate him. Rev. John Mc- 
Neill, the evangelist, now a chaplain in France, writes 
that "soldiers now want straightforward dealing with 
their spiritual needs and problems.^ They want the 
'central verities,' no beating round the bush, no skilful 
skating near the subject and evading it, no velvet- 
glove dealing with their faihngs, but honest, frank, 
straightforward messages that point the way to hope 
and victory — given, of course, with sympathy of un- 
derstanding and tenderness of appeal. This is what 
the men want and will listen to." ^ 

It is not only those that are living in the midst of 
suffering and looking into the face of death and upon 
whose lives temptations are beating fiercely who long 
for spiritual truths which are eternally reliable and suf- 
ficient.^ Thoughtful men and women everywhere are 
reexamining their faith and trying to search out its 
vital elements. There is a need that all of us should 
reorganize our religious thinking around the central 
fact of Jesus Christ as the Divine Son of God and 
the living Redeemer and Lord of men. 

1 The same longing is found in the training camps on this 
side of the water. See the article, "The Soul of the Sol- 
dier," by Joseph H. Odell, in The Outlook, Dec. 26, 1917. 

2 The Missionary Review of the World, November, 1917, 
page 865, 

2 See the article, "The Eternal, Changing Gospel," by Pro- 
fessor E. L Bosworth, in The North American Student, 
January, 1918. 



18 J'HE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

This should be a period to date from in creedal 
histoiy. It is becoming strikingly apparent today that 
the really essential features of our faith are those 
which are common to all the branches of organized 
Christianity. How dull we shall be if in all our com- 
munions we do not begin to throw a new and sharp 
emphasis upon these vital elements of faith, letting 
the elements which are less essential to pure Chris- 
tianity, although more characteristic of our own di- 
visional formulae, fall into the background. Let us 
waste no regrets if the upheaval of these years shakes 
Christianity clear of many of its historical shroudings 
of dogma and of formalism. As in our separate Chris- 
tian divisions we fall back upon what is essential to 
Christianity we shall come to realize anew our oneness 
in Christ as a body of believers and, however much of 
organic unity may develop, we shall draw closer to- 
gether in mutual understanding and common effort. 

2. A demand for reality is being made also by our 
national life. We realize how impelling the call is 
for a vital and truly conquering religion when we 
consider the great sections of our corporate life that 
before the War were pagan areas. The task before 
the Christian Church even at that time to carry the 
spirit of her Lord into all human relationships was a 
staggering one. Our Christianity was not vital and 
stalwart enough to carry the strain. But when to 
these demands that community life and all human con- 
tacts be fully Christianized there will be added after 
the War the vast problems of reconstruction, read- 
justment and reconciliation, what will organized Chri»- 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 19 

tianity be prepared to offer as a remedy and a hope? 
There is no basis for despair, for Jesus Christ is fully 
competent to meet all the demands that human society 
can make upon Him. It rather is a ringing summons 
to the Church to recognize her day of visitation, to 
forget non-essentials in training every energy on the 
fulfilment of her task, to show her faith by her works. 
More specifically, men are asking today for a re- 
ligion that will so take hold on the national life of 
Christian peoples as to bring wars to an end. Con- 
vinced in our deepest souls that, facing conditions as 
they were, we were bound to enter this war, we are 
yet forced to admit that if Christianity had been 
freely expressed in its followers, it would have 
ended wars long ago. Whenever there will be 
enough of Christ in our Christianity, that will happen. 
Mr. Henry Morgenthau, formerly American Ambas- 
sador to Turkey, once said to a friend that "J^sus 
has exercised more influence on human history than 
any other personality. We shall never get out of war 
except by following His teachings." The overwhelm- 
ing majority of thoughtful minds share Dr. Fosdick's 
conviction that Christianity is sure to end warfare as 
it increasingly controls the conceptions and lives of 
its followers. He draws the parallel of slavery. 
Slavery and Christianity "lived in peace together." 
But the time came when "men saw, with regard to 
slavery, the clear implications of the Gospel; they 
perceived that Christianity and slavery could not per- 
petually live together in the same world. The issue 
was drawn: Christianity would be a failure if it did 



20 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

not stop slavery. And from the day that the issue 
was drawn, the result was assured. It was not Chris- 
tianity that failed; it was slavery. . . . This, too, is 
a climactic day in history. For so long time the 
Gospel and war have "lived together in ignoble amity. 
If at last the disharmony between the spirit of Jesus 
and the spirit of war is becoming evident, then a great 
hope has dawned on the race. . . . Christianity will 
indeed have failed if it does not stop war" ^ This is 
the definite and alluring task of men and women who 
are followers of the Prince of Peace and worshippers 
of the God "who maketh wars to cease unto the end 
of the earth." 

3. But a yet larger demand for reality in religion 
rises up out of the world's need. If we fail to recog- 
nize the universality of the Christian religion we fail 
to understand it or to realize its power. It is just be- 
cause Christianity is competent and sufficient to meet 
the needs of the entire world that it is adequate for the 
needs of any one nation or any one life. Its divine 
message and errand are for all mankind. But religion 
lacking in reality can never become a universal relig- 
ion. It is without the vitality required both for the 
world's need and for its own projection. 

We who stand at the distributing bases of Chris- 
tianity must ever remember that the kind of religion 
we develop here is the kind of religion we send abroad. 
There is no potency of angels to change it in the 
process of export and no alchemy of the salt seas to 

1 Harry E. Fosdick, "The Challenge of the Present Crisis," 
pages 18, 19, 20. 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 21 

alter it in transit. Well may we consider therefore in 
solemnity whether there are genuineness and vitality 
enough in the religion and the democracy w-e now hold 
to make them fit not only to survive but to be prop- 
agated and to become victorious throughout the world. 
It is a searching question that was recently asked, "Is 
the Christianity we are sending from land to land 
loaded with some fatal disparagement such as forbids 
its wide expansion?" To quote Mr. Oldham again: 

The attitude of the non-Christian peoples towards Chris- 
tianity will be determined in the end by what Christianity 
actually is in practice, and not by what missionaries declare 
it to be. . . . The Christian protest against the unchristian 
forces in social and national life must be clearer, sharper 
and more patent than it has been in the past. It may be that 
the Church as it was before the war could never have evan- 
gelized the world; that its witness had not the penetrating 
force necessary for so gigantic an undertaking.! 

The sobering question challenges us sharply. Is our 
religion really worth giving away to other nations? 
Is mine? Every Christian life is a point of export for 
Christianity. The call to reality culminates in this 
demand that each of us develop within his own life, 
in order that it may be worth communicating, a Chris- 
tianity that is simple, direct, essential, dynamic, Christ- 
like, because it is genuine. 

Are we then to withhold our religion from other 
lands until it has become purified and thoroughly 
potent in our own land? There are those who con- 

1 J. H. Oldham, "The World and the GospeV pages 20, 21. 
The reader is referred to the first two chapters of the book for 
an excellent treatment of this whole subject. 



22 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

tend that while "there is so much to do at home," the 
sending abroad of our Christianity is an error in tac- 
tics and a betrayal of patriotism. They say, "First 
let us carry Qiristianity into all our attitudes and re- 
lationships at home aftd then we shall be in a posi- 
tion in all good conscience and sound logic to carry 
it abroad." But in such a proposed sequence both 
conscience and logic break down. The whole genius 
and history of Christianity are against it. In follow- 
ing this procedure we should never catch up with the 
first part of the program and the world would wait 
forever for Christ and His ideals of democracy. 

Indeed, one strong reason why we should at once 
share our religion more widely with other nations is 
that a great enriching of our democracy and purifying 
of our religion would result therefrom. When 
religion is restricted in its application, it loses in 
vitality. Its health demands that there be an outlet 
to the ends of the earth for its truth and its benefits. 
Professor William Adams Brown does not exaggerate 
when he says that "unless we can make Christianity in 
fact what the missionary consciousness sees it to be 
we shall soon have no Christianity worthy of the 
name." ^ Localize religion and you deaden it. If the 
sending forth of Christianity were to issue in no benefit 
whatever to any other nation, the missionary task would 
still demand a place of primacy in the functions of 
the Christian Church. The more any individual life 
communicates its religion to other lives, the more 
religion it generates for itself. The more religion any 

^International Review of Missions, October, 1917, p. 510. 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 23 

church exports, the more it develops for its local re- 
quirements. The more organized Christianity as a 
whole becomes missionary, the more it becomes united, 
robust and socially competent at home. "The evan- 
geHzation of the world in this generation." Let a 
man drive that stake and tie his soul to it and there 
will be reality in his religion. 

Entirely apart from these reflex benefits to our- 
selves, there are three compelling reasons why we 
should not delay in propagating our religion among 
the nations. 

One is in order to give proof of whatever reality 
there is in our religious life. Is it not true that a 
Christian who knows that his religion is meant for 
all humanity and that all humanity is in great need 
of it, but who is not concerned to have it applied be- 
yond the boundaries of his own nation, is a Christian 
to whom and in whom religion is not very real? As 
Jesus Christ becomes a living reality to any man or 
woman, dominating all of life and satisfying all of 
life, there develops within that man or woman a pas- 
sionate desire that all men should share His power and 
His peace. You can tell how much a man prizes his 
religion by his zeal to communicate it. Vital Chris- 
tianity demands its propagation. The oft-quoted words 
of Archbishop Whately set forth the case admirably: 
"If my religion is false, I am bound to change it ; if it 
is true, I am bound to propagate it." The best way 
to prove our conviction that our religion is not "played 
out" is to spread it abroad. 

Another reason for the immediate disseminating of 



24 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

our religion on an enlarged scale lies in the acute 
need of other nations for it. If the events of the 
past few years have demonstrated that with all our 
civilization and education and humanitarianism and 
ethical culture Jesus Christ is the only hope of the 
Christian nations, what words will express the hope- 
lessness of the nations we call non-Christian if He 
be not carried into their life as a purifying, energiz- 
ing, uplifting force? Through the centuries the sin 
and suffering and darkness and despair of those lands 
have cried out for the living Christ. But in this bitter 
hour, which throws its gloom and its tragedy across 
their life as across ours, how much more pressing and 
pathetic is their need for Him. And that need will 
be accentuated yet further by causes which the War 
is developing. Now, as never before, Jesus Christ is 
"the Desire of nations." 

Finally we come to a most convincing and timely 
reason for the immediate disseminating of our religion, 
namely, that thereby we may make good the gains 
which we seek through the War. This is a point we 
can scarcely overemphasize. If we are without hypoc- 
risy in our statements of the issues we fight for, if the 
noble utterances of the President of the United States 
are a measurable expression of the aims of the Allies, 
then we are waging in Europe and Western Asia and 
Africa a war for the rights and welfare of mankind. 
W-e are prepared to go steadily on until a victory is 
secured which will make every part of the world a safe 
abode for democracy. "The Kingdom of God is first 
righteousness and then peace." But let us not forget 



THE CALL FOR REALITY IN RELIGION 25 

whence democracy has come. It is Jesus Christ Who 
brought the ideals of democracy into the world and 
Who is keeping them and developing them in the 
world. Take His influence from any nation and that 
nation's democracy will die overnight. Two-thirds of 
the people in the world know nothing of Him and His 
democratic ideals. The value of a human life, the 
sacredness of personality, the essential equality and 
brotherhood of all men and the responsibility of each 
to all are lessons men learn from Christ. Is it likely 
that any land where they have not been learned is going 
to say, "Go to, let us become a true democracy" ? It 
is the wide proclamation and acceptance of the teach- 
ings of Jesus that will make the great non-Christian 
areas of the world safe for democracy, for He is its 
Author and Exemplar and Champion. "Whom the 
Son makes free is free indeed." For this reason Dr. 
Robert E. Speer speaks of foreign missions as "a 
great peaceable and constructive agency of equaliza- 
tion, transformation and freedom." 

It is clarifying and stimulating to realize that wag- 
ing the War and spreading Christianity are not sepa- 
rate undertakings, but that the tearing down process 
of the one and th-e building up process of the other 
have the same goal. That goal is nothing less than the 
realization of the Divine purpose for humanity, a pur- 
pose which centers in the infinite value and sacred 
rights of every child of the Heavenly Father in every 
nation of the earth. These ideals are foundation prin- 
ciples of democracy. A great material force has sud- 
denly risen in Europe to attack them. The attack 



26 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

must be beaten down so that those principles 
shall be preserved in Christian nations. At the 
same time they must be made indigenous in 
non-Christian nations 'through the liberating power 
of Jesus Christ. As we bear in mind the ulti- 
mate issues that are involved, we realize how futile 
it would be to win the War in Europe if at the same 
time we failed to press with redoubled vigor its 
constructive counterpart, which is the dissemination 
through all the world of the democratic spirit and 
teaching of Jesus Christ. Let us see to it that 
nothing of the sacrifice being made by the legions 
of valiant men who represent us in Europe shall come 
to nought through our dullness of vision or our lack 
of loyalty to the larger interests of the Kingdom. 
Alfred Casalis, a young French soldier who at the age 
of eighteen was killed in a bayonet charge, said short- 
ly before his death :*'This war must not be sterile; 
from all these deaths there must burst forth new 
life for all mankind." ^ Our men yonder are prepared 
to give "the last full measure of devotion" on their 
front; many have already given it. What measure 
are we prepared to give on this other front — of the 
world's evangelization ? 



*"For France and the Faith," Letters of Alfred Eugene 
Casalis, page 75. 



CHAPTER II 

THE CALL FOR CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 

The thoughtful follower of Jesus Christ has much to 
explain today. He has to explain the devastated areas 
of the earth, its darkened homes, its widows and 
orphans and refugees, its lines of cross-capped mounds 
that keep growing ever longer, the anguish of its hos- 
pitals, the men whose bodies or spirits are broken for 
life, the hate and savagery with which the strife is 
being waged. He has to explain the fact that over 
four-fifths of the race of men are engaged in the 
brutalizing work of human butchery and are not only 
exhausting their resources of manhood and woman- 
hood, of treasure and science and skill and acumen, 
in the horrible business, but are planning to go on and 
on with it. 

He may assert in all truth that neither Canada or 
the United States had anything to do with starting the 
War, that their aims and those of their allies are just 
and noble, that a Christian idealism more than any- 
thing else constrained them to enter the conflict and 
that force of arms seemed to be the only available 
instrumentality for the triumph of that idealism. But 

27 



28 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

he has still to account for the twofold fact of war 
itself, hideous, sulphurous war, and of the pride and 
greed, suspicion and jealousy, selfishness and material- 
ism that lie back of the war ; ^ and in the end he is 
obliged to admit that the spirit of Jesus is being flouted 
and denied and brought to an open shame. 

In this chapter we come up to the need of Chris- 
tianity for a great vindication. What impression must 
the War be producing on the minds of the non-Chris- 
tian peoples of the world, even those that have be- 
come involved in it? Many Christians in the West- 
ern nations, facing the problems of suffering and sin, 
have found their faith wavering and have been asking. 
Is God really good? Does He really care? Can 
Christ really be alive and actively at His task in the 
world today? Should we wonder if similar question- 
ings are in the minds of non-Christians the world 
over? Should we blame men of the brown and black 
and yellow races if they say, "So there's your Chris- 
tianity! There's your civilization, of which you 
boasted that Christ was at the heart of it. Its foun- 
dations are giving way. Our religions may be blamed 
for many things, but it cannot be charged that they 

^ Dr. Sidney L. Gulick says : "The causes of the European 
tragedy are now fairly clear. In brief, they are the selfish, 
national and racial ambitions, aggressions and oppressions, 
justified by the materialistic theory of evolution through the 
struggle for existence and the survival of the strongest, the 
conviction that might and need make right, secret diplomacy, 
intrigue, falsified international news, cultivated suspicion, 
fear, animosity, and enormous expenditures for military pre- 
paredness." — "America and the Orient," pp. 2, 3. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 29 

ever produced or permitted such destruction and car- 
nage as we see within Christian countries today." 

Multitudes of course do not argue as far as this, 
and many argue beyond it and make a just distinction 
between essential Christianity and the civilization that 
has been called Christian. But, as Mr. Oldham says, 
"The spectacle of peoples which bear the name of 
Christ, seeking to tear one another to pieces, cannot 
but be a shock to the faith of the Church in the mis- 
sion field and a stumbling-block to thoughtful non- 
Christians." ^ Count Okuma, of Japan, recently said 
in effect to a Christian leader from the United States, 
"Many thoughtful Japanese are now questioning the 
value of Western civilization. Perhaps our friends 
in America will not be so sure now about having 
something to give us." Some non-Christian Chinese 
not long ago were found praying that their gods would 
stop the awful slaughter in Europe. Even the least 
advanced and enlightened peoples must share in the 
surprise. That is what gives pathos to the humor of 
a cartoon which appeared in the London Punch show- 
ing two barbarians, very fierce and very black, in 
their crude war regalia, singing together a lusty duet. 
The caption of the cartoon was "The Black Man's 
Burden"; beneath was written, "Refrain by natives 
of South Africa and Kikuyu," and the title on the 
songsheet was "Why do the Christians rage?" 

The ugly fact is that the name of the religion of 
our Lord which is in our keeping has been besmirched 
and has become a by-word among the nations. The 

1 J. H. Oldham. "The Decisive Hour: Is It Lost?" p. 9. 



30 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

new question that has arisen in the minds of the non- 
Christian peoples regarding the worth of Christianity- 
is perfectly fair and cannot be answered by a few 
earnest words of explanation. The Confucianist in 
China, the Moslem in Egypt, the pagan in Patagonia 
are entitled to a better and more practical answer, an 
answer that will really vindicate the true character 
of Christianity. 

To the question as to how this vindication may be 
made there can be but one answer, namely, through a 
positively Christian internationalism. 

It has been evident that a new internationalism 
has been on the way during recent years. Dr. Mott 
wrote in 1914: "Every day civilization is becom- 
ing more and more international. National thought, 
national custom and national action are giving way 
in every sphere to internationalism. Races which 
have had nothing in common are discovering increas- 
ingly their interdependence, and are seeking earn- 
estly to understand each other and to find ground 
for cooperation. For thousands of years the East 
and West have lived apart; but it becomes more and 
more evident that their destinies are blended and that 
for all the future they must live together." ^ But the 
time has arrived when the new internationalism is to 
become a more widely experienced fact. The reshap- 
ing of international relations after the War will be 
the historical occasion for its realization. "We are 
living in a time of plasticity. The old moulds have 

1 John R. Mott. "The Present World Situation," pp. 99, 
100. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 31 

been broken and civilization will be re-formed." It 
will be a new international order, but will it be an 
essentially better order? We must bear in mind that, 
as a writer in The New Republic ^ puts it, "the organi- 
zation of this better international society will not ac- 
crue automatically as the result of victory." By no 
means. A radically improved international order will 
come to pass only if in the writing of the final peace 
terms and in the future agreements and relationships 
between the nations more of the spirit of Christ be 
introduced than has ever before been exhibited in 
international affairs.^ 

The Anglo-Saxon nations of North America may 
play an important part in bringing about this better 
order. They have entered the War without selfish 
purpose or desire. They may foresee trade expansion 
or other advantages that would not have come to them 
had they not become belligerents, but it cannot in jus- 
tice be said that either Canada or the United States 
entered the War with any conscious purpose of selfish 
gain. The good they strive for at tremendous sacrifice 
is the good that they wish to share with all humanity. 
Again and again has this ideal been expressed by Presi- 
dent Wilson, as when he said, in addressing a joint 
session of the two houses of Congress on April 2, 
1917: 

The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace 
must be planted upon the tested foundations of political 

1 Issue of August 18, 1917. 

2 A very searching and practical treatment of this subject 
is outlined in Dr. S. L. Gulick's "A New Eera in Human 
History," a four-weeks course for group study and discussion. 



32 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

liberty. We have no selfish ends to serve. We desire no 
conquest, no dominion. We seek no indemnities for our- 
selves, no material compensation for the sacrifices we shall 
freely make. We are but one of the champions of the rights 
of mankind. We shall be' satisfied when those rights have 
been made as secure as the faith and the freedom of nations 
can make them. 

So far, so good. Our war aims up to the present 
are unselfish and Christian and it must be the effort 
of every Christian citizen of these countries to main- 
tain them on this lofty plane and to guard them from 
any admixture of lower motives. But we must go 
further. If we are to do our share in making the 
new internationalism thoroughly Christian, there are 
three main requirements that must be met. 

I. We Must Develop an International Mind Among 
Christians. 

Provincialism is one of the fundamental and be- 
setting sins of the United States. Canada, perhaps 
by reason of her imperial connections, is less faulty in 
this respect, but breadth of outlook could hardly be 
reckoned a distinguishing trait of the average Cana- 
dian. On both sides of the line the recent years have 
registered a steady improvement, a farther look and a 
better perspective, but the degree of insularity that 
impoverishes and stultifies us still is appalling. In a 
day when the interests of the nations are so inter- 
locked, when improved communications are abolishing 
distance, when the maps of the world keep shrinking 
on our walls, provincialism in any quarter is an an- 
omaly. Let us with one mind recognize that national 
isolation is forevermore impossible, doubly $o by rea- 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 33 

son of this War in which more than four-fifths of us 
who inhabit the world today have mingled our posses- 
sions and our lives and our concentrated thought and 
which will serve to strengthen and multiply our con- 
tacts in the years to come. Now, if never before, the 
minds of all of us must shed their provincialism and 
move out from county and township limitations into 
the large inviting areas of world interests. Many. 
Americans today are thinking in national terms, many 
Canadians in imperial terms, many Asiatics in con- 
tinental terms, many Latin Americans in terms of a 
hemisphere. But there are far too few really inter- 
national minds engaged in a consideration of the af- 
fairs of the day. 

Particularly is it true that Christians should think 
by a world map. "Surely we of all men ought to 
stand for the great conviction that there is only one 
race and that is the human race." Jesus set no nar- 
row national limits for His kingdom. He intended 
that its message and its gifts should be equally for 
all. It would be a fallacy to restrict the time limits 
of the Kingdom to the era of Jesus and the apostles 
and it is equally fallacious to confine its space limits 
to any portion of the world's population. As Dr. 
Fosdick says, "A Christianity that is not international 
has never known its Master." ^ 

All logical men are either individualists or world 
citizens. There is no consistent middle ground. The 
Lord's Prayer of the individualist runs thus, "My 
Father, Who art in Heaven, give me this day my daily 

1 "The Challenge of the Present Crisis," p. 76. 



34 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

bread and forgive me my trespasses, Amen." The 
Lord's Prayer of the world citizen utters verbatim the 
prayer which our Lord taught. 

What are the characteristics of the international 
mind? 

L For one thing, it seeks to inform itself regarding 
other countries and races. A mind does not change 
from the parochial to the universal overnight. It 
must be submitted to an exacting discipline of inquiry 
and investigation. More than any others those who 
claim to be citizens in the world Kingdom of Jesus 
Christ should be painstaking in their study of people 
and conditions in all countries. How fascinating, 
how stimulating to the spiritual life and how reward- 
ing in one's cultural development this study is we need 
not here consider. The point to be noted is that the 
actual interests of every disciple of the universal 
Christ lie wherever men live who need Christ and that 
the duty of becoming intelligent in regard to humanity 
the world around is one no Christian can escape.^ 

2. In the second place, the international mind de- 
velops right conceptions of nationalism. As one con- 
tact has kept piling on another among the nations of 
the world it has inevitably resulted in the growing 
consciousness of each as a national entity. The Great 
Wall of China in the days of her isolation did not give 
her a true sense of nationhood. But when she came 
out from her seclusion and her national life began to 
touch the national life of other peoples, she at once 



*For a fuller discussion of this subject see pamphlets pub- 
lished by the Student Volunteer Movement. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 35 

began to develop a national self-consciousness. To- 
day in every nation of the world there is either a 
strong or a rapidly growing sense of nationhood. Is 
this to be deplored as militating against the develop- 
ment of an international consciousness ? Far from it. 
For there is no conflict between the two. An ardent 
Canadian patriot may be a British Imperialist and by 
the same token a world citizen. The international 
mind not only emancipates the national mind, it glori- 
fies and enriches it. It raises patriotism above all 
noise and buncombe and brag and gives it a lofty 
moral quality. "Patriotism," says Lord Bryce, "con- 
sists not in waving a flag but in striving that our coun- 
try shall be righteous as well as strong." The new 
Christian internationalism will embrace the redeemed 
nationalism of many peoples. 

But nationalism must be redeemed. Essential as it 
is, it may have many blemishes. Dr. Gladden recently 
said that he was afraid of an "outburst of the disease 
of nationalism." One of its perils is pride. Does 
anyone say that the Germans have -elevated their 
national pride to the point of insolence towards 
man and blasphemy against God? Let him remember 
that though they may represent the high type of 
national arrogance they are not the only sinners. 
Like the Pharisees who felt so secure in their 
special privileges and sacred traditions as to say "We 
have Abraham to our father" and kt it go at that, 
there are many Canadians who seem to feel that 
since Canada is Canada all will be well in the end, 
for are they not the specially favored of God? And 



36 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

there are many Americans who place their confidence 
in the size and wealth and prestige and past achieve- 
ments of their nation and assume that it is the elect 
among the nations of the earth. The man is a moral 
ostrich who buries his head in the sand of the cheap 
assumption that there is any particular Divine concern 
for his own particular nation and who says, as some 
one has put it, "God takes care of fools, children and 
the United States." And England and France and 
the other Christian states, have they not the same 
evil of national pride to be repented of ? 

Another peril of nationalism is self-righteousness. 
If only it were as easy to forsake this sin as it is to 
acquire it! How ready we are to stand on so high 
a pinnacle of the temple that we can look over the 
faults of the farthest nation and overlook those of 
our own. What a facility we have to camouflage this 
self-righteousness as loyalty, as we cry out those pagan 
words of false patriotism, "My country, right or 
wrong." How ready we are to play up our qualities 
of independence and ruggedness and resourcefulness 
and to neglect the weightier matters of the law, mercy 
and purity and sincerity and social righteousness. 
How quick we have been with the finger of scorn in 
these recent months, pointing if this way and that at 
the enormous sins of our enemies and forgetting that 
the root evils in those nations are to be found in vary- 
ing degrees in the national life of ourselves and our 
allies. Is it possible that our very consciousness that 
the cause which we are defending in Europe is a just 
and holy one is adding to our self-complacency? God 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 37 

will have to forgive us much if the recognition of 
shortcomings in others does not lead us to self-exami- 
nation and penitence and a resolute purpose to set our 
own house in order. 

And another peril of nationalism is selfish ambition. 
This sin has never been monopolized by Germany. 
With all Britain's wonderful record of international 
fair play and beneficent colonization, her ideals have 
been lowered by selfish dreams of territorial, as well 
as commercial, conquest. And Canada's ambitions for 
the world greatness of the Empire and for her own 
place of power within the Empire are not above re- 
proach. In the United States there is a widespread 
zeal for a place of world leadership that is not based 
on any humanitarian motive. Seven Seas, published 
for the Navy League of the United States, has this 
to say: 

World Empire is the only logical and natural aim of a 
nation, . . . The true militarist believes that pacifism Is the 
masculine and humanitarianism is the feminine manifestation 
of natural degeneracy. ... It is the absolute right of a na- 
tion to live to its fullest intensity, to expand, to found colo- 
nies, to get richer and richer by any proper means, such as 
armed conquest, commerce and diplomacy.* 

The Washington Herald seconds the motion : 

Great Britain and the United States going hand-in-hand 
to lead the world into a warless era is only a beautiful 
dream. Bombs and dollars are the only things that count 
today. We have plenty of one. Let us lay in a good supply 
of the other and blast a path to world leadership as soon as 
opportunity presents itself.'' 

1 Articles by Edward H. Finlay, September and November, 
1915. 
^ Quoted in The Christian Statesman, January, 1917. 



38 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

These are the utterances of selfish nationalism gone 
mad. They do not express the ideals of the majority, 
but they reflect aspirations of national self-seeking 
which are all too current today. 

The international mind delivers nationalism from 
these perils of self-confidence, self-righteousness and 
self-interest. It leaves men true to their local patriot- 
isms but lifts them to a higher loyalty. *T see now," 
said Edith Cavell, a few hours before her execution, 
"that patriotism is not enough. I must die without 
hatred or bitterness toward anyone." It reminds na- 
tionalism that even in its highest glory it is not 
an end in itself and calls it to lay tribute its special 
gifts and ideals to the common service of humanity. 
"Nationality is sacred to me, because I see in it the in- 
strument of labor for the good and progress of all 
men." In these words Mazzini was the voice of the 
international mind. In his vision of the Holy City, 
John observed that "the Kings of the earth bring their 
glory into it," each nation bearing its own distinctive 
gift, which when emptied into the common advantage 
of all becomes its glory. 

Will the separate gift of France be the splendor of 
sacrifice? This alone is enough to make her immor- 
tal. Will the distinguishing gift of the United States 
be the ideal of liberty? All the crises of her national 
life have gathered about this controlling passion. 
Will the distinctive gift of Canada be the power of 
self-realization through service? She is losing her 
life in the Empire's cause and finding it in her own 
growing nationhood. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 39 

3. A third characteristic of the international mind 
is that it takes a respectful and friendly attitude to 
other national and racial societies. It is intolerant of 
any power that would question the right of every 
nation, even the smallest, to the opportunity for self- 
reaHzation, free development and expanding life. Its 
racial judgments are kindly. It recognizes the inter- 
dependence of all nations. It respects the high quali- 
ties of each and in humility awaits the lessons it may 
learn and the gifts it may receive from each. And 
its attitude towards other nations is serviceable. In 
the spirit of Jesus it demands more than common 
decency and a square deal. If in one hand it holds 
the scales of justice it holds in the other gifts of 
friendly service. And in this way of service it as- 
sumes the nation will realize its worth and its destiny. 
"Not what a nation gains," says Admiral Sir David 
Beatty, "but what it gives makes it great." 

Coupled with the duty of developing for one's self 
an international mind there goes the duty of building 
up in others the same psychological and moral atti- 
tude. It is to be thought of in terms both of a per- 
sonal attainment and of a propaganda. Professor 
William Adams Brown considers that to develop with- 
in man the missionary consciousness — which means 
the international mind made fully Christian — is "not 
a mere technical matter for specialists" but is "man's 
supreme task and his most splendid opportunity." ^ 

^International Review of Missions, October, 1917. "De- 
veloping the Missionary Consciousness in the Modern man." 
p. 510. 



40 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

We see, then, that if the true character of Chris- 
tianity is to be vindicated before the world there must 
first of all be developed among Christians an inter- 
national mind, by which we mean a mind that is in- 
telligent regarding other peoples, that has developed 
a true conception of nationalism and that holds to- 
wards other nations a respectful and friendly attitude. 
And this brings us up to the second requirement. 

II. We Must Christianize all our International Con^ 
tacts. 

It is many years since Western civilization began 
to overflow its banks and today it is washing in upon 
the outermost nations of the East. Probably few 
would disagree with Dr. Robert E. Speer that in the 
large the impact of the West upon the Eastern na- 
tions and upon Africa has brought to those nations a 
benefit. But that is only because the good that has 
been carried from the shores of the Christian nations 
has been great enough to outweigh a large mass of 
baneful influences.^ 

The lanes of communication have steadily been 
growing wider and more numerous between the Chris- 
tian and the non-Christian peoples of the earth. These 
paths of communication include political conquest and 
colonization, commerce and trade, diplomacy and 
treaties, international laws and agreements, explora- 
tion and adventure, world travel, industry, science and 

1 For excellent treatments of this subject see John R. Mott's 
"The Present World Situation," Chapters III and IV, Presi- 
dent's Faunce's "Social Aspects of Christian Missions," Chap- 
ters IV and V, and Robert E. Speer's pamphlet "The Impact 
of the West on the East Must be Christianized." 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 41 

education, telegraph, cable and mail service, the period- 
ical press and other literature_, deputations and com- 
missions, student migrations and a host of others. 

It is not possible here to do more than touch on a 
few of the Western contacts that should be Christian- 
ized in view of the conditions which are likely to 
develop as a result of the War. 

One of these is commerce. The non-Christian 
world has suffered pitifully at the hands of the com- 
merce of Christian nations.^ Think of some of the 
commodities of trade. Though the traffic in slaves 
is pretty well stamped out, memories of the "open sore" 
remain in Africa. The opium curse is almost past in 
China, thanks not so much to Great Britain who in- 
troduced and maintained the traffic as to China herself 
who went on her knees to that Christian Government 
and finally got relief in the early part of 1917.^ But 
the United States, together with Britain, lost no time 
in pressing on China the cigarette as a substitute for 
opium. The British-American Tobacco Company has 
distributed free millions of cigarettes to educate the 
public taste. Its slogan was and is, "A cigarette in 
the mouth of every man, woman and child in China." 

1 The large advantages which cammerce has brought to 
non-Christian peoples and the degree of Christian spirit in 
which much of it has been carried on are not reviewed here, 
since the present purpose is to point out those aspects of 
commerce which are in need of being Christianized. The 
same qualification applies to industry and the other contacts 
discussed in this chapter. 

2 Prior to 1905, twenty-two thousand tons of opium went 
into China annually. Now not an ounce enters legally. 



42 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

And Great Britain no sooner washed her hands of the 
opium traffic which she had carried on with China by 
way of India than she began to soil them again by the 
trade in morphine whicli she has been supplying to 
China through Japan. An immense trade in intoxi- 
cants has been driven with the non-Christian peoples. 
In this matter the United States has been especially 
guilty. When Mary Slessor went to her pioneer work 
in the slums of Africa she found there only three 
marks of Western civilization, guns and chains and 
rum. In one recent year Christian nations sent three 
million gallons of rum to Southern Nigeria, making 
up in that single item one quarter of the imports of 
the Colony.^ The same trade is being rapidly devel- 
oped in China and elsewhere in the East and in the 
Pacific Islands. The Japan Times ^ fears that as 
prohibition gains in the West there will be no restric- 
tions in the exports of wines and spirits to Japan and 
the other parts of Asia. 

Think, too, of the methods employed by the com- 
merce of Western civiHzation with non-Christian peo- 
ples. The record is a shameful one. Confidence has 
been abused. The ignorance and helplessness of back- 
ward peoples have been capitalized by the white man. 
The operations of large companies and syndicates tend 
to be dehumanized even in domestic commerce; but 
in commercial dealings with remote and unresisting 
masses of people they have easily run to an accepted 



^In other parts of British Africa this traffic has been 
reduced or abolished. 
2 Issue of July 23, 1916. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 43 

policy of merciless exploitation. In the enlarged 
commercial undertakings which after the War will 
link the United States and Canada more closely with 
non-Christian countries and Latin America^ it is of 
vast importance that both in materials and in business 
dealings this commerce should be conducted in a man- 
ner worthy of Christian nations. 

Industry is another part of the impact that should 
be Christianized. Already an industrial era has set 
in in Asia and Southern Africa. Hankow and Osaka 
bid fair to rival the great industrial centres of the West. 
And wherever industry has gone it has carried not only 
its advantages but its attendant evils as well — child- 
labor, unsafe machinery, overwork, underpay, occu- 
pational diseases, unsanitary factory and living con- 
ditions. The atrocities charged against industry in 
Putamayo in Peru and in the Congo country are 
vivid in our memories and are too horrible to recite. 
They were exceptional, we admit; but greed and ex- 
ploitation have played a large part in the industrial 
enterprises carried on among backward peoples by 
vigorous and experienced and wealthy Christian coun- 
tries. Those peoples are still being victimized by the 

1 Mr. S. G, Inman, in the February, 1918, Men and Mis- 
sions, says : "In the new world war after the present war, the 
war for commercial and cultural supremacy, the battle will 
rage more intensely in Latin America than in any other part 
of the world. Every great nation of the earth is now mapping 
out its campaign to win supremacy in these twenty republics 
of the south which are to see the same remarkable develop- 
ment in the twentieth century as did our own country in the 
nineteenth." 



44 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

cupidity of capitalistic interests in Christian nations; 
their labor conditions still amount in some cases to 
virtual slavery; they are exposed to the evils of dis- 
possession of their lands-, forced labor for private un- 
dertakings and merciless disregard of their rights in a 
hundred ways. 

Competent observers anticipate that after the War 
the industrial development of non-Christian lands will 
be rapid. The shuttles of trade will fly fast and far. 
Capital will flow in from outside sources. Not only 
will industrial concerns of the West erect plants in 
remote places in the Orient and Africa, but un- 
dreamed of industries will develop under native aus- 
pices. The Christian lands of the West can have a 
large influence, both by organization and by example, 
upon the nature of these new industrial conditions. 
In industry, as in trade, international operations should 
be conducted with an eye to mutual advantage. A 
just profit and a benefit conferred should be the double 
aim. This is the irreducible minimum of a Chris- 
tianized industry. 

The press of Christian nations must also be Chris- 
tianized. This agency constitutes an influence on the 
non-Christian world of ever growing power and in 
the years that lie ahead its influence will undoubt- 
edly be greater still. There are two respects in which 
this factor of our influence as Christian nations should 
be safeguarded. One is that the papers should faith- 
fully mirror the finest spirit and ideals of the nation. 
It is, indeed, the function of the press to be in advance 
of the public in lofty idealism. It creates as well as 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 45 

supplies a demand for news. Yet how often this 
leadership is prostituted to the baser ends of profit. 
Many American and Canadian newspapers are as 
able and high-principled as any in the world. But at 
the other extreme are the papers that pander to cheap 
and debased minds which they further cheapen and 
debase. Their columns are garbage heaps of trash and 
filth. What purports to be news is often an exaggera- 
tion or distortion of the facts. As an educated citi- 
zen of Bangkok or Bombay reads such a paper in 
his home city or as an Oriental student reads it in 
San Francisco or Boston, what impression does it give 
him of American civilization and ideals, and indirectly 
what impression of the religion of the land that pro- 
duced the paper? 

Another respect in which the influence of our press 
should be jealously guarded is in its utterances regard- 
ing the people and affairs of other lands. Garbled 
news and sensational items are bad enough, but often 
there is apparently a deliberate effort on the part of 
some papers to stir up friction between their home 
country and other nations.^ Even careless writing 

1 As an illustration of this we quote from an outrageous 
editorial published on January 5th, 1918, by the New York 
American (and presumably by other Hearst papers) : 

"The war in Europe, hideous as it is, is merely a family 
quarrel compared to the terrible struggle that will some day 
be fought to a finish between the white and the yellow races 
for the domination of the world. 

"The only battles (of the past) which count are the battles 
which saved white races from subjugation by the yellow 
races, and the only thing of real importance today is the 



46 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

may be a very troublesome factor.^ The daily And 
periodical press should be a potent influence for main- 
taining international equilibrium and good relations. 
We have no finer vehicle of friendliness towards other 
nations. 

The foreign policies of Christian nations should be 
Christianized. They should be frank and open and 
disinterested. Treaties should be scrupulously kept 
in letter and in spirit. Diplomacy should rest on 
statesmanlike principles of fair dealing. Happily this 
has been prevailingly true of British and American 
foreign policies. China will never forget that the di- 
plomacy of the United States under John Hay pre- 
vented her dismemberment and under Theodore Roose- 
velt returned a large part of the Boxer indemnity fund. 
Those were strokes of Christian diplomacy. But can 



rescue of the white races from conditions which make their 
subjugation of the yellow races possible. . . . 

*Ts it not time that the white nations settled their quarrels 
among themselves and made preparations to meet their one 
real danger, the menace to Christianity, to Occidental standards 
and ideals, to the white man's civilization, which the constantly 
growing power and aggression of the yellow race continually 
and increasingly threaten?" 

1 Dr. Gulick gives as an instance the report in one paper 
that there were 30,000 Japanese in Mexico, a figure which 
grew to "400,000 veteran troops" by the time it was discussed 
in a leading American magazine, A month later that magazine 
in an article by an "authority" gave 250,000 as the latest 
army estimate of Japanese troops in Mexico. Investigation 
at the Naval College and at the Department of War revealed 
that in reality there were then in Mexico fewer than 4,000 
Japanese men, women and children. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 47 

American diplomacy in regard to Colombia and Pan- 
ama be defended in good conscience? And have the 
foreign policies of Great Britain been free from the 
spirit of aggrandizement? The most brilliant and suc- 
cessful and benevolent colonizing power known to his- 
tory, has she not been known to grasp, consolidate her 
gains and grasp again? "'It is a perilous thing," says 
President Wilson, "to determine the foreign policy of a 
nation in the terms of material interest." The oppor- 
tunity that will offer when the War is over for Chris- 
tian nations to illustrate their ideals and adorn their 
doctrine, to practice the Golden Rule and play the 
Good Samaritan, will be unique in history. Both 
Great Britain, with Canada sitting in her councils, and 
the United States will have the chance for a coup d'etat 
in the Kingdom of God that will go far to vindicate the 
true character of their religion. 

The treatment of foreigners who come as strangers 
within our gates is another impact calling for the spirit 
of Christ. Happily much has been done to welcome 
and help these strangers; but our slate is far from 
clean. Latin Americans, Japanese, East Indians, to 
say nothing of other immigrants, have had just 
cause for complaint. But the Chinese have per- 
haps suffered the most.^ A leading citizen of 
Japan said recently to Mr. Taft, that if the 
treatment accorded to Chinese in America had 



^In "America and the Orient" Dr. Gulick recommends a 
policy in regard to oriental immigration which will conserve 
American institutions, protect American labor from danger- 
ous economic competition and promote intelligent and en- 
during friendliness between America and Eastern nations. 



48 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

been experienced by Japanese, his countrymen could 
not be restrained from war. Mr. Taft has cited the 
cases of fifty Chinese who were murdered by Ameri- 
can mobs and of one hundred and twenty others who 
have suffered ill-treatment and loss of property. Full 
protection of life and property, already guaranteed by 
the American government, should be provided in fact. 
The immigration and naturalization laws of Canada 
and the United States should be void of every offense. 
Travelers from Oriental countries, and students from 
the East now in our institutions of learning not only 
should be treated with respect and courtesy but should 
be exposed to the most wholesome and truly repre- 
sentative elements in our corporate life. Scattered 
throughout the non-Christian nations are many men 
and women who have had such an experience during 
their stay in some Christian land. But there is a large 
number of others who have carried back another story 
to their countrymen. We should jealously guard this 
point of influence. It can go far to represent to the 
world the true quality of our religion, for here we 
reach other civilizations by the short cut of person- 
ality and in the classes just named through men of 
present or potential leadership. 

Another line of influence which is powerful through 
the direct and intensive impact of personality is to be 
found in those who go out on a variety of errands 
from Christian lands to lands that are non-Christian. 
Incalculable harm has come to those nations and a 
serious set-back to Christian influence through the 
unworthy lives of many who have travelled or lived 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 49 

among non-Christian peoples. We make no sweeping 
condemnations, for many who have gone forth in 
governmental, business and other relationships have 
been true followers of Christ and have thrown their 
lives into the balance in His favor. But from every 
non-Christian land come tales of traders, soldiers and 
sailors, sportsmen, engineers, dentists, globe-trotters, 
men in the political and consular services and others 
whose lives have been a disgrace to their nations, a 
discredit to Christianity and a hindrance to its develop- 
ment. Unfortunately many of the non-Christians 
who observe them consider that they represent a type 
of character which is standard in their nations and 
that their lives are part of the product of Christianity. 
Our governments should put high character first 
among the necessary qualifications for any appoint- 
ment to a post in a non-Christian country. Business 
firms should do the same. Some concerns already 
refuse to appoint any but Christian men to represent 
them abroad. Men and women who go out on their 
own initiative, on whatever errand, should not lower 
their standards when they come into non-Christian 
lands. Rather they should scale them up, for now 
they have a more distinctive and more keenly ob- 
served position as representatives of the religion of 
Christ than when they were at home. They can 
either exalt Him or drag His name in the dust. Since 
in the years that will follow the War the num- 
ber of men and women in whose persons the life of 
the Christian nations will reach across into the non- 
Christian nations is certain to be greatly increased, 



50 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

this line of influence should now be more carefully 
safeguarded than ever. 

There are many other points of contact with the 
non-Christian world which the spirit of Christ should 
dominate, but we do not stop to consider them here. 
Let us only pause to remind ourselves that with each 
succeeding year our whole manner of life in Canada 
and the United States is making a more direct and 
powerful impact upon the nations outside. Now as 
at no previous time they read us like an open book. 
Through the picked young men and women who 
come over to study in our colleges and universities ^ 
and later return to places of large influence in their 
own countries, through the letters written home by 
Orientals who are now domiciled here, through the 
press and other literature, through the reports of 
special commissions and deputations, through moving 
pictures and many means besides, they are examining 
and estimating our conduct. The Kingdom of God 
cannot make much headway in those lands unless it 
makes corresponding gains here. Dr. Speer is right 
when he says that "it is vain to send out little bands 
over the world to preach the Gospel of purity and 
peace, love and power, if in our social, industrial and 
racial conditions in America we are preaching un- 
cleanness, strife, enmity and failure." Many a mis- 



iln 1917 there were about 6,000 students from foreign 
countries in American institutions of learning. Of these, 1,400 
were from China, 1,000 from Japan, 150 from India, 2,000 
from Latin America. In all, nearly eighty nationalities were 
represented. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 51 

sionary has hung his head in shame when after pre- 
senting the power of Christ to redeem all human life 
he has been controverted by facts regarding unre- 
deemed life in his own land, facts which he knew 
were authentic. 

To the Christianizing of this whole impact we 
Westerners should give prayerful and energetic at- 
tention, and should lose no time about it. There is 
a demand for urgency for five reasons. First, be- 
cause the Church is undoubtedly on the eve of put- 
ting forth her greatest missionary efforts and cannot 
afford to be handicapped by what is now the most 
serious obstacle to the spread of Christianity through 
the earth. Second, because the Christianizing of the 
totality of the impact is necessary to offset the wrong 
impressions of Christianity produced by the War. 
Third, because in the years following the War the 
nations, now being shaken together, will be more sen- 
sitive to the touch of each other upon their lives and 
the points of contact will multiply. For the sake of the 
intensified influence of the West on the East and also 
of the East on the West every contact should be Chris- 
tianized. Fourth, because with the increasing break- 
down of the old civilizations and religious beliefs the 
East will more than ever be influenced by so-called 
Christian civilization. Every door and window fac- 
ing towards the West will be thrown wide open. 
Fifth, because amends should be made at once for 
all the un-Christian and anti-Christian influences that 
have marred the impact in preceding decades. 

This, then, is the convincing and urgent summons to 



52 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

organized Christianity and to every Christian disciple, 
that we should give thoughtful, concentrated attention 
to the Christianizing of all our relationships with 
other peoples, so that the great international arteries 
of tomorrow will be not so much a network of cables 
or a complexity of treaties or a developed system of 
commercial interchange, but pulsating lines of human 
interest and sympathy and service, in the spirit of 
Jesus Christ. 

in. We Must Actively Spread the Christian Mes- 
sage Throughout the World. 

But if the Christianity of the United States and 
Canada is to be fully vindicated, more is necessary 
even than right psychological and moral attitudes and 
the Christianizing of the many lines of communica- 
tion along which the life of our nations makes its im- 
pact upon the nations of the East and Africa and 
Latin America. The third requirement is that we 
distribute the message and spirit of Christianity 
among all the nations. 

\. It is only the wide dissemination and acceptance 
of the Christian message that will render safe the vari- 
ous contacts of which we have been speaking. It has 
already been pointed out that we have been rapidly 
becoming international in the various aspects of our 
life. But it is to be remembered that it is dangerous 
to become international in these other relationships if 
we do not at the same time make our religion inter- 
national. Every new contact that is opened up repre- 
sents a peril to both ends of the line. As we reach 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 53 

out with our influence into the non-Christian nations, 
is it safe to teach them to read Western literature, 
for example, and then leave with them no Christian 
literature? They will be abundantly supplied with 
translations of indecent French novels and the writ- 
ings of Paine and Voltaire and Huxley. Is it safe 
to cultivate their intellects, making them efficient in- 
struments of good or evil to themselves and others, 
and not attach those intellects to the highest uses ? Is 
it safe to give them the principles of self-government 
and a strong nationalistic spirit and leave them to 
run riot among themselves and to run amuck among 
the nations ? What save those Christian ideals which 
are the soul of democracy can render them steady and 
unselfish in the government of their affairs ? Is it safe 
to go to them with our industry with all its attendant 
difficult problems and leave behind the only solution 
for those problems? Is it safe to lift their scale of 
living and make organized and complex their social 
life and tell them nothing of the Christian principles 
that should order and safeguard social relations? Is 
it safe to give them capital and not a Christian sense 
of stewardship? Is it safe to teach their hands to 
war on a scientific and deadly scale and not carry to 
them^the lessons of the Prince of Peace? Is it safe 
to dig their canals and build their railroads and open 
their mines and develop their agriculture and their 
industries, making them strong in these respects, 
stronger in some cases than ourselves, and not teach 
them the obligations of service that rest upon strength? 
Is it safe to expose them to the worst elements in 



54 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

Western life and isolate them from the best? Is it 
safe even to set before them high standards of moral- 
ity and then leave them to despair and defeat because 
they had not been given a knowledge of the living 
Christ? Apart from the dynamic of the Christian 
Gospel, all our other international contacts will bring 
a net loss to them as individuals and as societies and 
will react ruinously upon ourselves. This is the one 
international communication that we must not fail to 
establish. 

2. Unless the Christian message is carried throughout 
the world, peace among the nations will not become 
isecure. For the message of Christ is characteristically 
a message of peace. A multitude of the heavenly host 
announced His coming into the world with a glad cry 
of *peace' and ^goodwill.' As He went out of the 
world He left peace as His one legacy. "Peace I leave 
with you." And it was the peace not of inward se^ 
renity alone but of outward amity as well. Himself 
the world's great Peacemaker Who broke down the 
middle wall of partition between men and reconciled 
them all to God, He blessed those who would share 
with Him in the work of reconciliation. "Blessed are 
the peacemakers." The first word of His great 
Prayer throws all men into a common family as 
brothers. His central teaching was God's loving 
Fatherhood. So when He sifted down God's will for 
men He reduced it to a twofold command, the first 
and great one, 'Love God,' and the second, quite like 
the first, He said, really a part of it, *Love thy neigh- 
bor/ When later He added a new commandment, it 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 55 

Simply called for special love among His own fol- 
lowers. In loving He laid down His life and for- 
evermore the Cross is the sign and pledge of peace. 
Christianity is not only the direct antithesis of war, 
it is the strongest unifying force in the world. In it 
alone we find the ^'great positive and wholly adequate 
conceptions of peace." 

The missionary agent is in His own person a strong 
mediating influence. He proclaims a gospel of law- 
fulness, order and discipline and is a powerful instru- 
ment of peace within the nation to which he goes. It 
is sometimes charged that the missionary creates dis- 
content and disorder. The charge is wholly false, 
save in the sense that he aims to produce a divine dis- 
content with sin and to turn upside down what was 
wrong side up. In that sense he is a wonderful dis- 
turber. Otherwise he is a peace agent. He goes to 
fierce warlike tribes and leaves them law-abiding, in- 
dustrious citizens. He counsels contentment and 
obedience to government. He lives not beside but 
among the people. He knows and loves them. He 
comes not to spend a few years, earn a pension and 
go home, but to make his home with them for life. 
They come to trust him and confide their grievances 
to him. He mediates between them and the govern- 
ing powers. Many a civil war has he prevented. 

And the missionary mediates between his adopted 
country and other countries. He is often called into 
counsel by governments when difficulties threaten, and 
volumes might be written to illustrate his influence in 
preventing friction and possible war. He stands be- 



56 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

tween East and West, a trusted interpreter of each 
to the other. The greatest mediating personality that 
today interprets Japan and the United States to each 
other and helps them to clasp hands is no traveler or 
economist or diplomat, but a missionary, Dr. Sidney 
L. Gulick. And he is but a type of a goodly fellow- 
ship of missionary mediators. Dr. Arthur H. Smith, 
of China, himself a distinguished member of the same 
group, says that foreign missions are "a sociological 
force which is unobtrusively but irresistibly working 
toward the introduction of a Christian climate all over 
the earth. . . . Christian missions are seen today to be 
the most effective instrument for mediating between 
and bringing together fragments of the human race 
long isolated, radically different, and too often bitterly 
antagonistic. They are in a unique way humanity's 
clearing-house of ideas and ideals, of motives and 
movements."^ There is much truth in a recent state- 
ment that "the key to world peace is in the hands of 
the missionary." 

The message of Christ proves to be a message of 
peace also in that it furnishes a corrective, guiding 
influence in the development of new democracies. 
We have already seen that the spread of Western 
civilization produces among nations that had been iso- 
lated and backward a national self-consciousness, 
patriotic ambitions, aspirations toward self-govern- 
ment, a development of latent resources, human and 
material, and an eagerness to appropriate new ele- 

1 "China and America Today," pp. 235, 236. 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 57 

ments of strength from every available source. In 
the process friction points with other nations develop 
and the growing nation is apt to absorb the worst 
aspects of the life and standards of the outside world. 
If that is all, it is soon ripe for trouble with any 
nation whose interests cross its own. What was the 
meaning of the "Yellow Peril" talk a few years ago? 
Why did Napoleon say of China, "Yonder sleeps a 
giant; let him sleep"? Simply this, that if China 
should grow mighty in the manner we have described 
and without any great moral and religious ideas to 
modify her selfish ambitions and point her powers in a 
better way, that nation, the largest in the world and 
possessed of enormous natural and personal resources, 
might pursue her own schemes of self-interest and 
aggrandizement until she would threaten the well-be- 
ing of the world.^ The spirit of Jesus, which bids a 
nation to be more concerned to recognize the rights of 
others than to demand its own and to realize its 
greatness in friendly service, is the only adequate cor- 
rective of national ambition. The nation that learns 
to bow the knee to Him in worship and obedience 
will have no zeal for international strife. 

The spreading of the Christian message tends to 
maintain peace because of its effect upon those who 
propagate it. It is the exalted type of international 
goodwill. If the missionary purpose ran high in the 
Christian nations of the world it would color all their 



1 Sir Robert Hart, who knew China better than any other 
British statesman of his time, said, "China is today the 
greatest menace to the world's peace unless she is Chris- 
tianized." 



58 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

international attitudes and undertakings. There 
would be in each a spirit of chivalry towards the 
weaker nations, of service towards the needier nations. 
There would be in each an attitude of partnership 
and comradeship towards the other tiations of the 
Christian faith and a disposition to share its best with 
all mankind. Does this sound idealistic? Neverthe- 
less it is precisely a missionary motive that is needed 
at the heart of Christian nations today, for this is the 
positive aspect of international unselfishness. "We 
yet shall learn," says Dr. Fosdick, "that the best ar- 
mament of any people is the friendship of the world, 
won by constructive goodwill." ^ The two broad 
principles that are contending today for supremacy in 
international relations are self-advantage and service. 
The ultimate expression of the one is militarism; of 
the other, foreign missions. And when the Chris- 
tians who are filled with a consuming missionary 
passion, a passion to give the best among their best, 
which is the message of Christ, to all mankind, shall 
become numerous enough to determine national 
thought and action, there need be no fear that Chris- 
tian nations will wage war upon the non-Christian 
nations or quarrel seriously among themselves.^ 
3. The disseminating of the Christian doctrine 

1 The Challenge of the Present Crisis," p. 94. 

2 In The Constructive Quarterly, September, 1916, Canon C. 
H. Robinson, of England, wrote: "We believe that the best 
prospect of the reconstruction of a good understanding be- 
tween the peoples of Great Britain and Germany lies in an 
increasing recognition of the ideals for the promotion of which 
British and German missionaries stand." 



CHRISTIAN INTERNATIONALISM 59 

and spirit throughout the world is necessary for the 
further reason that only thus can our denials of Christ 
be oifset. Sadly have we failed as Christian nations 
to acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus Christ before 
the rest of the world. We have failed in our national 
life and in our international dealings. Nothing can 
wipe out the past. There is but one thing that can 
possibly offset it, and that is overcoming our own evil 
with our own good. And we have nothing good 
enough to overcome the evil save the message of Jesus 
Christ. That we can send, a message taught and in- 
carnated by chosen and devoted ambassadors, a mes- 
sage of redeeming power for individuals and societies. 
Mr. Morgenthau, a Hebrew, formerly United States 
Ambassador to Turkey, says : "The missionaries have 
the right idea. They go straight to the foundations 
and provide those intellectual, physical, moral and 
rehgious benefits upon which alone any true civiliza- 
tion can be built." ^ Dr. Edward T. Devine, Pro- 
fessor of Social Economy at Columbia University, 
carries the story a step farther. "The activity of Amer- 
ican and other foreign missionaries in Western Asia 
during the present war has been one of the few bright 
features, evidence that even in war the blackest cloud 
may have a silver lining." ^ Looking at their work 
from another angle. Sir W. Mackworth Young, 
K.C.S.L, formerly Lieutenant-Governor of the Pun- 
jab, said on his return to England: 

1 The Missionary Review of the World, January, 1918, p. 14. 

2 Columbia Spectator, August 14, 1917. 



60 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

As a business man speaking to business men, I am pre- 
pared to say that the work which has been done by mission- 
ary agency in India exceeds in importance all that has been 
done (and much has been done) by the British Government 
in India since its commencement. Let me take the Province 
which I know best. I ask myself what has been the most 
potent influence which has been working among the people 
since annexation fifty-four years ago, and to that question I 
feel there is but one answer — Qiristianity, as set forth in 
the lives and teaching of Christian missionaries.! 

It is men and women of that sort that we are to 
send out to represent Christianity, to bring it to bear 
upon the deepest needs of individual men, and the most 
baffling problems of national life. They are the ex- 
ponents of the most competent agency of international 
service. 

The answer, then, to the problem of expressing the 
true character of Christianity in our day is the two- 
fold one of making Christian our internationalism and 
making international our Christianity. Jesus Christ 
will thus become His own vindication. Let us avoid 
the fallacy that the mere winning of individual con- 
verts to the Christian message apart from the Chris- 
tianizing of all human relationships can bring in the 
Kingdom of God. And let us avoid the other fallacy, 
which is its corollary, that the Kingdom of God vdll 
come among men by treaties or international organiza- 
tions or peace programs or any other instrumentality 
apart from the active and definite spread of Christ's 
message of the Kingdom. 

^ Quoted in The Missionary Review of the World, Janu- 
ary, 1918, p. 15. 



CHAPTER III 

THE CALL OF NEW OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION 
FIELDS 

Every day the effects of the World War upon the 
whole life of humanity are becoming more evident. 
The force of the impact between the two armed forces 
into which the world has been divided is seen not so 
much in the way the nations immediately concerned 
are reeling under the shock, as in the way the crash 
has set the uttermost parts of the earth vibrating. The 
non-Christian lands of the earth from end to end 
have been deeply affected, and from the standpoint of 
their evangelization the effect has been one of an en- 
larged opportunity. 

A few years ago an international Christian leader 
challenged the Church of Christ by writing over the 
existing world situation the phrase, "The Decisive 
Hour of Christian Missions." Surely the words did 
not exaggerate. But these war years seem to have 
brought us to a decisive moment within that hour. 
We are to consider in this chapter some of the factors 
in the opportunity which now summons the Church to 
throw a new intensity into her world task. 

61 



62 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

I. New Difficulties that Have been Created. 

First we should frankly face some of the new dif- 
ficulties involved. Nothing is gained by averting our 
eyes from those elements- which have recently come 
into the situation, making it one of greater difficulty. 
More than three- fourths of the non-Christian people of 
the world are either participants in the war or victims 
of it, and the other one-fourth are very distinctly 
affected by it. Immediately on the outbreak of the 
War some of the new problems began to appear. Let 
us now go over these difficulties and try to get clearly 
before us the nature and seriousness of each. 

1. The discrediting oT Christianity by reason of 
the War. 

We saw in the preceding chapter that this is essen- 
tially a war among nations called Christian, a family 
quarrel within Christendom. Millions of non-Chris- 
tians are amazed at the scope and ferocity of the con- 
ffict — dignified, progressive nations tearing each other 
apart, piling the battlefields high with dead, and sing- 
ing hymns of hate in a fiendish antiphony. ^And these 
were the nations which presumably were the flower 
of Christian civilization. Small wonder that many 
non-Christian people contrasted all this with the dia- 
metrically opposite teaching of the missionary that 
"the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long-sufiFer- 
ing, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, self- 
control." ^ What could they say to the Christians but 
"Where is now your God ?" This difficulty, as we shall 
see later, is not nearly so great as in the days just fol- 
1 Galatians 5 : 22, 23. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 63 

lowing the outbreak of the War, but it must still be 
reckoned with. 

2. The depletion of the missionary ranks. 

The staff in almost every field has lately been re- 
duced. Many missionaries have joined the colors of 
their countries, and some of these have been killed or 
permanently disabled. Many missionaries have been 
assigned to duty with military forces. For example, 
many of the men in the Honan mission of the Canadian 
Presbyterian Church have accompanied the thousands 
of Chinese coolies who have gone from that province 
to serve as laborers behind the lines in France. The 
only means of filling the places of these missionaries 
has been the taking over of their duties by other 
workers, native or foreign, who were already over- 
burdened, and in some cases even this has not been 
possible. 

3. The suspension of work in the German missions. 
Almost the entire German missionary force has 

been withdrawn. Prior to the War, this force had 
included 1,227 men and 233 single women, or a total 
staff, if we include wives of missionaries, of more 
than 2,000 workers. Under their care there were 
722,349 baptized Christians, with a much larger Chris- 
tian community and scores of thousands of enquirers. 
Most of the German missionary work was carried 
on in British territory or in German colonies which 
early in the War passed into the hands of the Allies. 
Finally, the Allied Governments decided that the Ger- 
man missionaries in most of the fields must be de- 
ported or interned. This has meant an enormous 



64 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

missionary loss, especially in India, where tlie Ger- 
mans made up about one-sixth of the total missionary 
force. Assistance in many ways has been given by 
American, Canadian, British and other missionaries 
who have been working in the same fields with the 
German missionaries or in adjoining areas. But at 
best this aid has been limited, and much of the former 
splendid work of the German missionaries is now at 
a standstill. As the crippled missionary societies of 
Europe cannot be expected to do a great deal, the 
responsibility to care for this work until the German 
missionaries can return rests largely upon the mis- 
sionary agencies of North America. "This is not a 
question of Germany, it is a question of Christianity." 

4. The halting of plans for progress. 

Until the War broke out, almost every mission in 
Asia, Africa and Latin America was preparing for 
important developments. New buildings were to be 
erected, new surveys were to be made, new outsta- 
tions were to be opened, the frontiers of the missions 
were to be pushed back into unoccupied districts, a 
multitude of new programs looking towards efficiency 
and cooperation were to be launched. But the War 
came and most of these plans had to be suspended. 
The recruits that had been counted on could not be 
sent out. Increases in the budgets of the missions 
were in most cases impossible. Workers were de- 
tailed for emergency duties. And those who stayed 
at their posts had new drafts made on their attention 
and sympathies and energies. Readjustments had to 
be made almost daily. The plants were kept running, 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 65 

but while some departments were speeded up, other 
departments were slowed down, yet others were tem- 
porarily closed, and forward policies that had been 
decided on were for the most part filed away for future 
attention. 

5. Dijfficulties in the sending of reinforcements. 

The European societies have sent out practically 
no new workers since the beginning of the War. The 
societies of Canada have found it possible to add to 
their missionary force, though not in as large num- 
bers as before the War. The American societies were 
able without much difficulty to send out new workers 
to most of their fields, until the United States entered 
the War. Then the problems came thick and fast. 
First the selective draft had to be reckoned with. 
Here the difficulty was acute in the case of unor- 
dained men between the ages of twenty-one and thirty- 
one. Of these there were 450 already under actual 
appointment by the various Boards, not to speak of 
a large number of missionary candidates. There has 
been trouble, too, in the matter of passports, for in 
view of a wide abuse of such documents the State 
Department has been obliged to adopt measures of 
rigid restriction in the issuance of passports and per- 
mits to leave the country. European Governments 
have found it necessary also to become much more 
exacting in the examination of all persons, including 
missionaries, who desire to enter their possessions 
in Asia or Africa. All of this has greatly embar- 
rassed the missionary societies of the United States in 
the sending out of new missionaries. 



66 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

6. Difficulties in the sending of money and supplies. 
Owing to political restrictions and the deflecting of 

ships from their regular routes, communications have 
been cut off, for at least part of the time since the be- 
ginning of the War, between certain sections of the 
mission field and their supporting constituencies at 
home. In some cases neither money, mail nor sup- 
plies could get through. Drugs and other commodities 
for hospitals, books for the schools, condensed milk 
and other foods necessary to the maintenance of 
health, building materials for repairs and new struc- 
tures, supplies for agricultural and industrial processes. 
Bibles, paper for the presses, these and other necessi- 
ties have become scarcer and dearer or else have been 
entirely lacking. The German missions, of course, 
suffered more than others. Although the situation is 
on the whole improved now, there is hardly a field in 
which this difficulty has not been acute and it will not 
be removed until the War is over and for many 
months thereafter. 

7. The increased cost of missionary work. 

One of two reasons for this is the large advance 
in the price of necessary supplies. The other is the 
variation in the rates of exchange. Silver currency 
has risen greatly in value. In China, the Mexican 
dollar has nearly doubled, and in Persia the toman 
has more than doubled. The rupee has gone up in 
India and the yen in Japan.i 

1 "Some mission boards have had to appeal to their con- 
stituencies for additional contributions of over half a million- 
dollars merely to provide for the depreciation in the silver pur- 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 67 

8. The disrupting effects of the War on missionary 
work in battle areas. 

Actual fighting has taken place in four parts of the 
mission world, namely, Persia, Turkey, Shantung 
Province, in China, and the African colonies of Ger- 
many — Togoland, Cameroun, German Southwest Af- 
rica and German Southeast Africa.^ Many innocent 
persons were killed. Families were broken up. 
Houses were plundered and burned. Hundreds of 
natives were taken away as carriers. Whole regions 
were depopulated. In the Cameroun one station was 
seized by the government, the printing press of an- 
other was turned into a munitions factory, the treasury 
of another was requisitioned. For eighteen months 
the war raged throughout that field. In Persia, in 
Armenia and other parts of Turkey not only did the 
Christians suffer the loss of home and property, but 
hundreds of thousands went through the horrors of 
deportation, mutilation and massacre. 

These do not cover all the new difficulties that have 
entered into the situation. Nor do they take account 



chasing power of American money. If the price of silver 
continues to increase, this situation will become yet more dif- 
ficulty—Robert E. Speer, "Looking through the War Clouds." 
Missionary Review of the World, January, 1918. 

1 "Africa is, territorially, more completely involved in the 
War than any other continent. Only one small independent 
country, Abyssinia, is not actively engaged in the War. Even 
Liberia has enlisted in the fight for democracy. Practically 
every nook and corner of far-off, unknown Africa feels the 
burden of the present war."— i^/l the World, January, 1918, 
p. 16. 



68 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

of problems that will have to be faced tomorrow, 
problems of nations being modernized more rapidly 
than they are being Christianized, of growing democ- 
racies that may be governed by an tmworthy spirit, 
of new influences of Western civilization that will 
have to be counteracted, of the administration of 
missions that will increasingly desire self-government, 
and many other problems that even now are giving 
concern to missionary leaders. Those mentioned are 
sufficient, however, to indicate how disturbing and 
disrupting are the difficulties that have already been 
encountered. 

But, after all is said, might not this catalogue of 
problems and handicaps be listed in the credit col- 
umn? Are difficulties and perplexities not to be 
summed up in the Christian mind on the side of op- 
portunity? "Most gladly, therefore,** said the great 
apostle, "will I rather glory in my weaknesses, that 
the strength of Christ may rest upon me." ^ May we 
not see in these difficulties an opportunity for the 
power of God and the spiritual and superhuman char- 
acter of the missionary enterprise to be revealed? 
Ought we not to welcome them as a testing of faith, 
a summons to prayer, a strengthening of moral sinew ? 
Should we not regard them as an agency for the up- 
building of the Church in the mission field and the 
developing of native leadership? It is when they 
have been challenged most sharply by difficulties that 
Christian missions have won their most splendid 
triumphs. 

12 Cor. 12:9. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 69 

II. New Opportunities That Have Been Provided. 

Even if we write in bold letters the word "Oppor- 
tunity" across the difficulties that have been listed in 
the debit column, we must begin a fresh page in the 
ledger for the credit items, those positive factors pro- 
duced by the War which make the missionary task 
large with opportunity today. 

In this survey we must resist the temptation to 
stray into the field of conjectures and of future de- 
velopments, however desirable or probable these may 
be, and keep our eye upon those favoring conditions 
about which there is no uncertainty. 

1. The breaking down of conservatism and preju- 
dice. 

Progressive as the nations of the East have become 
in recent years, there has remained a mass of preju- 
dice and tradition that has retarded the progress of 
Christianity. Deeply ingrained ideas and long-cher- 
ished institutions always die hard. But great changes 
have been begun or accelerated during these war years. 
Many old opinions and old customs are gradually being 
discarded. The caste system in India, for example, is 
now undergoing its greatest strain. Three-fourths of 
the non-Christian population of the world are thrown 
together into the melting pot of the War, and most of 
the Christian peoples of the world are there with them. 
China, India, Japan, Egypt, each of the great non- 
Christian nations is conscious of the touch of the other 
nations in the War. It is a new sort of international 
contact, this grouping of all nationalities into those 



70 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

who fight with you and those who fight against you, 
but it is having its effects. 

Here is a man who went out from India as a 
soldier. Never before did his interest outreach his 
own community, and he carried with him a full set 
of prejudices and traditional customs. If he is a 
caste man, in the very crossing of ''the dark water" 
he broke caste rules. At Gallipoli he found himself 
a brother-in-arms of Australians and French, and in 
France he has fought side by side with British, Sene- 
galese, Canadians and Belgians. He is no longer a 
denizen of a hamlet in South India, he is a citizen of 
the world. He has compatriots undergoing like ex- 
periences in East Africa, in Egypt, in Mesopotamia. 
What wonderful things they have witnessed and ex- 
perienced since they left India! And the villagers 
back home turn out to hear their letters that tell of 
the great world outside. The fanciful letters written 
a few months ago by Mr. Kipling for a popular maga- 
zine, purporting to be from the pen of an Indian sol- 
dier, and the comments of his family on receiving them 
illustrate this line of influence and its upsetting of the 
old notions and prejudices. It is a hard body blow 
that the War is dealing to many of the institutions and 
ideas that belong to the order that is now passing in 
India. 

As custom loses its hold on the life of the non- 
Christian nations and as their prejudices and self-suf- 
ficiencies fall away we can see the door of opportunity 
swing more widely open to the entrance of the Chris- 
tian message. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 71 

2. The thoughtful and serious mood of non-Chris- 
tian nations. 

Some of these nations, like China, Japan and Siam, 
entered the War of their own free will. Many close 
observers of developments in China say that her par- 
ticipation in the War is awakening her to a realization 
of her responsibilities and opportunites. She is ap- 
praising the moral issues that she has made her own 
in the struggle and inquiring into the ideals on which 
her own national life is resting. Other non-Christian 
nations, such as India and the European colonies of 
Africa, were dragged into the War. They, too, have 
been looking into the deeper meanings of the struggle. 
Particularly is this true of India, where a new serious^ 
ness is said to be characteristic of Hindus, Moslems 
and Sikhs. Indeed, as Canon Gould has pointed out, 
"the penetration of the non-Christian world into the 
realities of the War and their perception of the real 
issues at stake is one of its most impressive and un- 
expected features." 

Democracy is today a more fervent and widespread 
doctrine among Eastern peoples than it was five years 
ago. And they are considering the far-reaching ap- 
plications of its spirit. The men from India are 
fighting in Europe for democracy. The question nat- 
urally arises, "What fellowship has democracy with 
foreign domination, as we know it in India?" The 
agitation for more self-government has, under such 
leaders as Mrs. Besant, assumed large proportions and 
Britain is preparing to deal generously with it. And 
a further question arises, "What fellowship has democ- 



72 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

racy with caste?" This question is a religious, as 
well as a social, one, and they must answer it them- 
selves. 

So we find in Asia a serious mood today. Profound 
questions are being asked. There is more plasticity 
than ever before and more openmindedness to the 
friendly counsel of the Christian democracies of the 
West. *'The forces and agencies that prove them- 
selves most vital now are the forces and agencies that 
will be recognized as supreme in the period that 
follows the war."^ It is the decisive hour for the 
shaping of the new ideals of the East. 

3. Dissatisfaction with the traditional faiths of Asia 
and Africa. 

As thoughtful men of Asia discern the moral is- 
sues of the War and as they recognize the need of a 
spiritual basis for their new national life, they are 
finding that their traditional faiths fail them. Japan 
has been called "a nation prospecting for a religion." 
Her government recently summoned leaders of Shin- 
toism. Buddhism and Christianity to a conference 
with a view to working out some satisfactory religious 
platform for the life of the nation. The including of 
Christianity implied that the traditional faiths of the 
Empire had failed. Shintoism now claims to be noth- 
ing more than a patriotic cult. And as for Buddhism, 
although there is in some quarters a revival of its 
propaganda, the situation was put fairly by Dr. J. D. 
Davis, when, after a life-time of service in Japan, he 
said : "Have it clearly in mind that the issue in Japan 
today is no longer between Christianity and Buddhism, 
1 Missionary Review of the World, December, 1917, p. 888. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 73 

but between Christianity and nothing. Japan has al- 
ready turned her back on Buddhism and is now seek- 
ing for some new basis of faith." 

The rehgions of China have disappointed her. In 
this time which searches into the realities of religion, 
China has turned to Confucianism and Taoism and 
Buddhism, her traditional faiths. But the questions 
she has brought are too many and too modern and too 
deep for those religions. It is true that reactionary 
movements both among Buddhists and Confuciusts 
have set in, for example, in Sze Chuan Province. But 
it is characteristically true in China that old idols are 
being taken out of the shrines and old temples are 
being torn down or turned into school buildings or even 
places of Christian worship. A Christian leader of 
China, now in the United States said recently, "The 
heart of the Chinaman is an empty shrine." 

"Why cannot Krishna save us?" is a stock question 
asked of Christian missionaries in India. The ques- 
tion is now becoming less speculative, more prag- 
matic, "Why doesn't he? For Krishna and all the 
other gods in India's pantheon and all the subtle 
metaphysics of Hinduism are not saving India. Hin- 
duism, in spite of the new patriotic propaganda in its 
favor, is not equal to the demands of the hour. It 
has no final solution for the problem of sin, it is not a 
character-producing religion, it has no gospel of social 
emancipation. It cannot weld the numerous races and 
ironclad social divisions of India into one harmonious 
and compact people. It cannot carry her through this 
crisis of her need. And India, the most religious 



74 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

country in the world, is finding that her great tra- 
ditional faith has failed her. 

The devout Mohammedan who is considering deep 
social and religious questions of the modern world is 
not satisfied by his formal observance of prayer pe- 
riods five times a day. When, intent on present-day 
problems, he reads the old Koran, must he not regard 
it as the book of a by-gone era? It gives back no 
answer to the fundamental questions that he brings 
relating to personal needs and social regeneration. 
Professor D. B. Macdonald, one of the most finished 
s-cholars in the field of Mohammedanism, says that 
"it is for the Christian schools and preachers to save 
these peoples, not only for Christianity, but for any 
religion at all." 

Obviously animism is without an answer to the 
broad and profound problems of today. The pagans 
of Africa are renouncing it, as they come into contact 
with the higher religions of Mohammedanism and 
Christianity. Mohammedanism has in recent years 
been making rapid strides in the Dark Continent and 
has been gaining more adherents than Christianity, 
because Christians have not been alive to the opportu^ 
nity and the danger. 

There is but one light that can dismiss the darkness 
of doubt and misgiving and despair from the religious 
life of the nations today and that is the Light of the 
World. Jesus Christ is the answer to the world's 
need and the solution of all its problems. The na- 
tions that long have followed other religions have now 
made room for Him and are waiting with their faces 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 75 

turned towards Him. It is the day of His great oppor- 
tunity. 

4. The collapse of Islam's political power. 

God pity their enemies, if the Mohammedans should 
ever tinite in a "Holy War!" So the world thought 
until a few months ago. There was something that 
froze the blood in fear at the very suggestion of the 
Moslems, to whom we were assured religion meant 
everything, rising in full force_, 230,000,000 strong, in 
their fierce, fanatical hatred of the Christians and in 
their cultivated aptitude for ferocity, and falling with 
flashing scimitars upon any foe against whom their 
wrath was stirred. But all this fear was wasted. For 
the test came in November, 1915. The Jihad was pro- 
nounced. It was strictly according to form and regula- 
tion. It came from Constantinople, from the right 
source, the Sheik ul Islam, the high priest of Islam, and 
the Sultan of Turkey. It was transmitted instantly to 
the faithful throughout the world — the first time in 
history that a universal Holy War had been ofBcially 
declared. The civilized world held its breath and 
waited for the impact. It has waited ever since and 
will wait while the world lasts. There cannot be a 
Holy War of Moslems. Why? Because there is 
no Pan-Islam. At one time in history there was, 
when Islam swept through North Africa and won 
the Barbary States and then crossed over into Spain, 
and when at the other end of the Mediterranean it 
conquered Southeastern Europe and torfe its way al- 
most to the gates of Vienna, making a vast horseshoe 
of religious bigotry and political power that threatened 



76 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

the civilization of Europe and the welfare of the 
world. When this onrush of Mohammedan advance 
was checked by Charles Martel at Tours the first blow 
was given to Pan-Islam. -May the present War not 
prove to be the final blow ? 

We were wrong if we supposed that religion means 
everything in the world to the Mohammedans. As it 
turns out, political ties are stronger with them than 
religious ties. There was no unanimous response even 
from the Mohammedans of Turkey. Many of them 
joined in the protests that poured in from Persia, 
from Morocco, Algeria and Egypt and from Mos- 
lems in Russia. As for India, the home of 67,000,000 
Mohammedans, there was no response save that of 
solid loyalty to Great Britain. The Mohammedan 
leaders of North India petitioned the British Parlia- 
ment to let Indian Mohammedans go to the de- 
fence of Egypt. The War has revealed the marvel- 
ous spectacle, well-nigh unique, of Moslem clashing 
arms against Moslem. The dream of a united political 
power for Islam is shattered forever. To cap the 
climax, most of Arabia has torn itself loose from 
Turkey, seized the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, 
the sacred places of Islam, and set up the independent 
Kingdom of the Hedjaz, with the Shereef of Mecca 
in the seat of power. In January, 1918, Turkestan 
followed suit by declaring its independence^. Dr. 
James L. Barton, of Boston, an authority on the Near 
East, says: 

1 According to a cable dispatch from Stockholm, dated 
January 16, 1918. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 77 

The opportunity of the ages confronts the churches of 
America and Europe. The Mohammedans of Turkey, Persia, 
Syria, Arabia, Egypt, all North Africa, India, and, in fact, 
wherever found, have lost much of their power and moral 
resistance, while their hearts have been made sad and tender 
by the sense of a disappointed hope and faith in a religion 
that has failed them. The door of approach to the Moham- 
medans is beginning to open. Will the church of Christ be 
ready to enter? 

5. The focussing of attention on the essential spirit 
and message of Christianity. 

As we have already observed, the first effect of the 
War on the estimate of Christianity throughout the 
non-Christian world was very unfavorable. It seemed 
as if the ground suddenly dropped from beneath 
every claim that the missionary had made for the 
validity and sufficiency of the Christian faith. Soon, 
however, a reaction set in, more careful investigations 
into the true character of Christianity began to be 
made and, although there still are and for many years 
to come will be many non-Christians who will quote 
the War and its root causes in Christian nations 
against the religion which those nations have pro- 
fessed, a new appreciation of the faith of Jesus Christ 
is showing itself far and wide thrcnighout the non- 
Christian world. 

Take Japan as a fair illustration. The non-Chris- 
tian Japanese leaders cried out loudly at first that 
Christianity had collapsed in that it had failed to pre- 
vent or stop the War. "But gradually the more 
thoughtful among them came to see that it was not 
Christianity but men and human institutions that have 



78 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

failed. Selfishness, international jealousy, greed, loss 
of the idea of brotherhood — these are the things that 
have engulfed us all in unspeakable horror. . . . And 
so there has been growing up in interior Japan a 
greater interest in Christianity, a desire to know what 
Christianity really is." ^ 

The discerning minds of China came to a similar 
conclusion. Throughout China there is a new appre- 
ciation of the Christianity of Jesus Christ. A profes- 
sor in a large American university was lecturing to 
his class on the causes of the War and began to 
defend Christianity against the charge that it had 
failed. He was interrupted by a Chinese student who 
said, "So far as the Chinese students in the univer- 
sity are concerned, you need not make a defence of 
Christianity. We were discussing the War at our 
meeting last evening and we were all agreed that the 
trouble in Europe was due not to too much of Chris- 
tianity but to too little of Christianity." Prince Dam- 
rong of Siam' said recently to some American travel- 
ers who were passing through his country: "Do not 
fear that we think Christianity is responsible for the 
war. We understand perfectly well that it is not 
Christianity that has failed, but the Western nations, 
and that if only peoples of the West had practiced 
the precepts of Christ there would have been no such 
awful struggle/' 

The non- Christian world in common with the Chris- 
tian world is coming to distinguish sharply between the 
Christian ideal and the spirit and practices of West- 
1 The Japan Evangelist, September, 1917. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 79 

ern Christendom. "What Christ came to do, what 
spirit and message the missionaries bear from Him 
to the world, is clearer to the minds of the non-Chris- 
tian peoples today than it was a year ago." ^ Especially 
among the non-Christian peoples fighting with the 
Allies, there is a clearer recognition of the true spirit 
of Christianity. The longer they struggle and the 
greater sacrifices they make in the interest of right- 
eousness, justice, freedom and the rights of the weak, 
the more plainly they see that Jesus Christ is the ulti- 
mate Champion of these great issues and the more 
clearly they discern in them His redeeming purpose 
for humanity and for the lives of individual men. 
The more sharply the moral issue is drawn, the more 
vivid the true spirit of Jesus becomes. As the back- 
ground grows blacker, the holy, loving figure of the 
Christ leaps into new splendor before the gaze of the 
nations. And the question "Where is now your God?" 
is receiving its answer. 

6. Influence of the witness of Christian martyrs. 

Viscount Bryce, who was Chairman of the British 
Government's Commission appointed to examine into 
the treatment of Armenians and Syrians, is as com- 
petent an authority on that situation as could be 
quoted. Cabling to the American Commission for 
Armenian and Syrian Relief recently, he referred to 
the martyrs of the early Christian Church who sealed 
with their blood the testimony of their faith and 
added : 



1 Robert E. Speer, "Looking through the War Gouds," 
The Missionary Review of the World, January, 1918. 



80 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

In our own times we have seen this example of fidelity- 
repeated in the Turkish Empire and it is strange that the 
Christians of Europe and America should not have been 
more moved by the examples, of courage and heroic devotion 
which the Armenian Christians have given. . . . Thousands 
of Armenian Christian girls were sold in the market or dis- 
tributed among Turkish officers to be imprisoned for life in 
Turkish harems and there forced into Mohammedanism. But 
many more thousands of Armenians, women as well as men, 
were offered their choice between Christ and Mohammed 
and when they refused Mohammed were shot or drowned 
forthwith. For days and days together the bodies of Chris- 
tian women who had thus perished were seen floating down 
the Euphrates. 

In the early Christian era the blood of the martyrs 
proved to be the seed of the Church. So it has been 
ever since. The most recent martyrdoms on a large 
scale were in connection with the Boxer uprising in 
China in 1900. There again Christianity thrived on 
martyrdom; One hundred and thirty-five missionaries 
and 16,000 native Christians laid down their lives for 
Christ rather than save them by apostasy. The Church 
began at once an unprecedented advance. In one lead- 
ing mission, one half of whose membership was swept 
away, the losses were made good in three years. Some 
churches in that time doubled their membership. And 
the advance has gone on with amazing rapidity to this 
day. 

Can it be otherwise in Turkey? What must ob- 
serving Moslems have thought as they saw that 
threats, tortures and atrocities could not shake the 
faith of the Christians who went to their death by 
thousands with Christian songs of praise on their lips. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 81 

Stand there as a Mohammedan persecutor and see 
that group of Christian students digging their own 
graves to the rhythm of hymns they learned at a Y. M. 
C. A. conference and comforting each other with the 
promises of God. Stand again a few days later and 
listen to another group of students passing out to 
their death and singing as they go: 

Whither, pilgrims, are you going, 
Going each with staff in hand? 

We are going on a journey, 
Going to a better land. 

How are you going to account for it? Hear them 
pray for you in love, as they "bow their necks the 
stroke to feel." What strange power is in their faith ? 
Can there be a living Presence with them? You 
cannot rid yourself of the conviction that a Moslem 
could not die like that, and that there is something 
in the faith of those men and women which you and 
your fellow-Mohammedans need. Already some re- 
ports are coming in that the Moslems have been deeply 
impressed, and that above the blood-soaked ground of 
Islam the green shoots of what may be a glorious 
harvest are beginning to appear. 

7. A new apologetic in recent demonstrations of 
Christian love. 

Amid the gloom and horror of the world's darkest 
experience there has appeared a shining display of 
magnanimity and brotherly love. We confine our- 
selves here to three expressions, among many, of the 



82 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

Christian spirit of service of which the non-Christian 
world has been witness within the past three or four 
years. 

One of these is the behavior of British missionaries 
towards the missionaries of an enemy nation. When 
the work of the German missionaries in India was 
imperilled by their inability to secure money and 
suppHes, it was the missionaries from Great Britain 
who were foremost in coming to their relief. While 
their fellow-nationals in Europe were in deadly com- 
bat, these representatives of Jesus Christ continued to 
love and trust each other. When the money of the 
German missionaries was all gone and they were in 
destitution, the British missionaries, out of their own 
slender incomes and with living costs rising steadily, 
made generous contributions in cash. When all Ger- 
mans were in danger of internment, the British mis- 
sionaries pled with the government, loudly asserting 
their own confidence in the good faith of the German 
workers. And when it appeared necessary at last 
that, the German missionaries should be deported or 
interned, the missionaries from Great Britain under- 
took to do all in their power to oversee the work in 
the now neglected fields and to shepherd the souls 
there who needed Christian instruction and leadership, 
until their German brethren could return. Other 
bonds broke, but the missionary bond held. It was a 
beautiful display of the spirit of Jesus and a mighty 
apologetic for Christianity in the presence of a great 
non-Christian people. The same spirit has been 
shown in Africa where the United Free Church of 



OPPORTUNITIES. IN THE MISSION FIELDS 83 

Scotland has recently taken over the work of the Basel 
Mission. 

The sacrificial ministrations of native Christians 
has been another witness to the power of Christ's 
loving spirit. The children in the schools that were 
founded in Africa by Mary Slessor of Calabar have 
made real sacrifices for the saving of Belgian children. 
Call to mind the conditions of outright savagery that 
prevailed among these people before the timid little 
mill-hand from Dundee carried to them the transform- 
ing spirit of Jesus Christ, and the meaning of this sac- 
rifice becomes luminous. Korean Christians in Cali- 
fornia recently made generous gifts for Armenian 
relief. In Southern Nigeria the Ekite Mission, al- 
though it has suffered severely through the War, con- 
tributed over $125 to the Prince of Wales' Fund. The 
Christian girls in a mission school in Ceylon asked per- 
mission to have dinner omitted from the schedule of the 
day that the money thus saved might go to the Belgian 
Relief Fund. A colony of 140 Christian lepers in Siam 
set apart a portion of their daily allowance for food in 
order that they might secure money for the relief of 
soldiers made blind in the War. Gifts of this nature 
have been reported from many parts of the non- 
Christian world. 

From Turkey ther-e come tales of Christians who 
have been showing a spirit of Christ-like charity 
towards their enemies. Not only are some of them 
announcing their intention of devoting their lives when 
the War is over to Christian service in behalf of those 
who have hated them and murdered their families, 



84 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

but even now many of them are ready with kindly 
ministrations in the spirit of Christ.^ 

In such ways the native Christians of the Levant 
are showing the spirit of Christ as worthily as that 
band of devoted missionaries 2 who are staying at 
their posts throughout Turkey, Persia and the Cau- 
casus, in deprivation and loneliness, letting their very 
lives drain out in sympathy and service, that they may 
give relief to hundreds of thousands of destitute, 
bleeding refugees. The sacrifices and ministrations of 
native Christians in this hour of the world's need are 
an argument for the sufficiency and adequacy of Chris- 
tianity that will never be controverted while the world 
stands. 

A third revelation of the Christian spirit of service 
is being made by those who have gone to serve the 

^An instance of this has recently been reported. "The 
Christians of the city, including the American mission college 
students, united in a movement to give the Turkish troops a 
good hot dinner. The troops had been obliged to drink only 
muddy water, but now the Christian women brought an abun- 
dance of cool, refreshing pure water to quench the soldiers* 
thirst. Imagine the surprise of these hungry and thirsty men. 
"Verily," they said to one another, "this is something new; 
never since the days of the prophet until now has such kind- 
ness been shown. No Moslem friend has come to give us 
food and drink without money and without price, but these 
Christians have supplied our every need without our asking." 
— The Missionary Review of the World, January, 1915, p. 3. 

2 "The missionaries connected with the Persian and Turkish 
missions alone have distributed over six milHon dollars' worth 
of relief in the last two years for Armenians, Syrians, Greeks 
and others, thus affording a magnificent demonstration of 
the quality of the religion which they represent." 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 85 

troops of non-Christian lands. From all the great 
mission areas of the world soldiers have streamed to 
the battlefields of Europe, Mesopotamia and Asia 
Minor. And wherever they have gone, Christ has 
gone with them, incarnated in disciples through whom 
He has been performing His acts of friendly service. 

Great bodies of Chinese have been sent to the West- 
ern front as laborers at the docks and on the roads 
behind the lines. A large force of missionaries, rep- 
resenting various churches, has migrated with them 
to France as Christian helpers extraordinary.^ 

Several battalions have gone from South Africa, 
Zulus, Kaffirs and Basutos, and are now serving as a 
Native Labor Contingent at the larger army bases and 
on the lines of communication behind the shelled area 
in France. Along with them there have gone African 
ministers and other experienced missionaries, carefully 
chosen for their close knowledge of African customs 
and languages and for their proven influence with the 
people. Senegalese and other African soldiers are 
doing active fighting in France, and work is planned 
or is already being done for these. 

Whole armies of Indians have left their native land 
to fight for the Empire, a motley array, but excellent 
fighting men. Scattered among these is a large force 
of the choicest Y. M. C. A. Secretaries and other mis- 
sionaries from India. "We have nearly a dozen 
races," writes one missionary, "ranging from the rest- 



*The Canadian Presbyterian Mission in Honan, China, re- 
ferred to above, has sent to France nine ministers and laymen 
and six doctors (almost its entire medical staff). 



86 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

less Afridis of the N. W. Frontier to the long-haired 
Burmese, the noisy Hindu and Moslem of historic 
plains, the aborigines of the Indian jungles, the Ben- 
gali from the steamy swamps, Christianized tribes 
from Shillong, and the 'head-hunters' or weird-looking 
Nagas from the higher mountains of Assam." ^ To 
this missionary, a Colonel remarked one evening after 
a lantern entertainment, "I can see you love these peo- 
ple; just feel at liberty to come into their camp and 
move amongst them whenever you like. The sort of 
thing you have done for them this evening will cheer 
them up wonderfully." 

Look at this swarthy Marathi. He is dictating to 
a young English missionary who is sitting beside him, 
writing page after page of a letter to a far-away 
Indian village. A plan has been worked out whereby 
that letter will be forwarded to a missionary in the 
neighborhood of the soldier's home, and he in turn 
will take the letter and deliver it in person. You see 
the look of confidence and gratitude on the soldier's 
face. Is he ever going to forget that kindness? All 
through the camps in France and Mesopotamia where 
Indian troops are found, this precise service is being 
rendered. 

Here is a stalwart Sikh. He is homesick and de- 
pressed. He has had no word from home for months 
and is longing for a glimpse of the old place and of 
his wife and little boys. Suddenly there is a cheery 
greeting and he looks up into the smiling face of an 



1 The L. M. S. Chronicle, November, 1917. Art, "India in 
France," A. W. Macmillan. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 87 

American Association Secretary from the Punjab. 
Soon the story is out. That night a letter goes from 
the Secretary to a missionary friend near the Sikh's 
home. The weeks pass by and again the Secretary 
comes upon the soldier, lonely and miserable. He 
takes from his pocket a snapshot of the Sikh's wife 
and boys, with the home in the background, and hands 
it to the soldier. And the big fellow is not ashamed 
of his tears, as he salaams again and again in grati- 
tude. This is not fancy, but blessed fact. 

In an endless variety of ways the hand of Christ 
is being stretched out to these men who have come 
from the ends of the earth. It is all being talked of 
among themselves, in the hospitals and trenches and 
base camps — yes, and among their compatriots in 
China and India and Egypt and pagan Africa as well. 
The workers in the Methodist mission at Pauri, North 
India, were hardly surprised when a soldier who had 
fought in France came to a recent service of the mis- 
sion. "He had walked sixteen miles just to say some- 
thing to the Christian congregation. He told them 
that he had been wounded in France, and though he 
was a poor soldier in a strange land, fine ladies nursed 
him in a way that the women of his own family 
would not have done. Such love and devotion as he 
saw in England convinced him that ours is the true 
religion. His own religion he knew was false because 
it did not produce such love. He wanted to learn 
more about our religion. Numbers of returned sol- 
diers, many of them officers, are openly leaning 
towards Christianity." When the War is over and 



88 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

the non-Christian soldiers will scatter up and down 
the cities and the country places of Asia and Africa, 
telling of the help they received from Christianity but 
not from their own religions, they will be forerunners 
of the evangel of the Son of Man. 

8. The increased vitality of the Church in the mis- 
sion field. 

In the face of disorganization, lack of supplies and 
the loss of leaders, the native churches have been gain- 
ing in strength. The doctrines of their faith have be- 
come new and living realities to them. Never has there 
been more of sacrifice, of Bible Study, of prayer, of 
missionary spirit in the Churches in the mission field. 

Look at the West African Mission of the Presby- 
terian Church. Over that field for eighteen months 
"German and Bulu fought French and Fang, British 
and Senegal." "The natural inference," says Dr. A. 
W. Halsey, "would be that with the destruction of 
property, the ravages committed by cruel, bloodthirsty 
soldiers, the removal of large numbers of the people 
and the killing of thousands of others, the cause of 
missions would suffer greatly." But one year after 
the Germans had been driven from Cameroun and 
the war clouds had passed over,' we find one church 
grown so large that the missionary found it necessary 
to organize seven new churches. The total attendance 
at these churches on one communion Sunday morn- 
ing was 21,400. That parent church reported 3,000 
as having confessed Christ within the year, of whom 
1,000 had been added to the membership. The same 
church reported that 250 evangelists and Bible readers 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 89 

were in training for Christian work and that the 
church contributions in the past year had doubled. 
It asked from America for the coming year only $950 
and planned to raise from its own membership the 
remaining $17,000 that would be needed for its vari- 
ous activities. Perhaps no other native church can 
duplicate this record from Elat. But throughout the 
mission world the closer home the War has come to 
the churches and the greater sacrifices it has demanded, 
the more the churches seem to have increased in num- 
bers and vitality. The church in the mission field will 
be a purified and more efficient instrument for the 
spread of the Gospel when the war period will come 
to an end. 

9. Large movements towards Christianity. 

From many parts of the non-Christian world there 
are coming Pentecostal tales of great accessions to 
the Christian Church. The revival movement con- 
tinues in Chosen,^ and according to Bishop Herbert 
Welsh there is an average of one convert an hour, 
day and night. The three-year evangelistic cam- 
paign in Japan which has overlapped the War has 
been fruitful beyond expectations and gathered such 
momentum that it could not stop with the end of the 
three-year period. The time is ripe for a great ingath- 
ering of converts. Never were there so many earnest 
students of the Bible. "Instead of driving men away 
from religion, the War is bringing a distinctly re- 
newed interest in religion." ^ in China various re- 

1 Mr. Willard Price in the Review of Reviews, June, 1916, 
states that there are 3,000 new Korean converts every week. 

2 The Japan Evangelist, September, 1917. 



90 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

vival movements among the masses have been in prog- 
ress and the educated classes have been coming by 
many thousands into the "churches. Inquirers are 
pressing up for instruction in greater numbers than 
can be cared for by the present staff of workers. An 
evangeHstic campaign similar to the one in Japan is 
being launched among the leading cities. In pagan 
Africa, whole villages and tribes are pleading for 
Christian instruction, tens of thousands of converts 
are being received into the churches, and the Bible is 
being eagerly read. The first missionary to get back 
to his post in the war-swept section referred to above 
lost no time in sending an urgent cable message to 
his Board in America. He was not asking for money 
or building materials, or even for reinforcements. His 
cablegram read, "Hurry up order for Bulu Gospels." 
The hearts of the missionaries there are breaking be- 
cause they cannot meet the pathetic demands coming 
out to them from the interior for the Christian message. 
In India the remarkable mass movement gains 
steadily. Whole villages and tribes keep pressing up 
for Christian instruction with a view to baptism. In 
one year the missionaries of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church alone were obliged to turn away 153,000 who 
wished to become Christians, because there were no 
workers to instruct and lead them. One church re- 
ports a waiting list of i,ooo. The Bishop of Madras 
says that fifty million outcastes are knocking at the 
doors of the Christian Church in India. Naturally 
there are many signs of alarm among the religious 
leaders of Hinduism over these immense ingatherings. 



OPPORTUNITIES IN THE MISSION FIELDS 91 

Even in Mohammedan lands there is such an eager- 
ness to understand the Christian truth as should shame 
us for our little faith. The Christian schools that are 
still open are crowded beyond capacity by Moslem 
children. In Egypt copies of the Scriptures and re- 
ligious tracts are being bought and eagerly read by 
Mohammedans and a spirit of inquiry is spreading 
even among Sheikhs and religious teachers. The old- 
est missionaries know of nothing like it. One mis- 
sionary writes: "In days gone by we sought to gain 
a hearing and were refused. Now it is as if the 
Moslem himself were seizing the missionary by the 
coat, saying, What was it you used to want to 
tell us?"' 

It is doubtless true that more converts have been 
received into the Church in the mission fields and 
more inquirers have come for Christian instruction 
and greater masses of non-Christians have been mov- 
ing towards Christ in the years since the War began 
than in any corresponding period in the modern his- 
tory of missions. 

In Latin America as well as in the non-Christian 
countries there is a new spirit of religious inquiry. 
Mr, S. G. Inman, the Executive Secretary of the Com- 
mittee on Cooperation in Latin America, on returning 
from his tour of Latin American countries during 
1917, reported that the shock of the world war has 
occasioned much deep religious thinking and that 
from university professors to laboring men there is 
evidenced a spiritual longing and a new openness of 
mind towards evangelical Christianity. This brings to 



92 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

the evangelical Christians of the United States a pe- 
culiar opportunity, since the former Latin American 
attitude of distrust and dislike towards their northern 
neighbor has now turned to one of friendliness and 
confidence. 

By these many voices of opportunity that are be- 
yond all precedent, God is sounding out His call to a 
mighty advance on all fronts throughout the mission 
world. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE CALL OF THE WORLD's PRESENT NEED 

In the first three chapters our attention has been 
upon the demands which the present world situation 
is making for a new expression of international Chris- 
tianity. In the three chapters that follow we are to 
consider the response which Christianity must now 
make if these demands are to be fully met. The first 
response must be by way of a sympathetic appreciation 
of the present actual human need. 

I. The Sympathies of the Christian World have never 
been so Responsive to the Sufferings of Humanity. 

One of the glorious revelations of the War has been 
the capacity of the human heart for sympathy, espe- 
cially the heart that has been influenced by the touch of 
Christ upon it. We have read of death and disaster 
and anguish till our hearts have grown sick within us. 
How often as we read detail upon detail of gruesome 
horror till the very pages seemed to be printed in crim- 
son, we have had to lay aside our reading, because we 
could not stand more. The strain was too great. And 
in the night, brooding over some harrowing thing we 
had heard or read, and reflecting that this was but a 

93 



94 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

type of the whole vast agony of "nations stretched 
upon a cross/' we have had to put a violent curb on 
our imagining lest our reason should leave us. For 
most of us this did not mean a merely morbid interest 
in widespread suffering. It meant that the finest thing 
within us, our sympathy, had been cut to the quick. 
True, there have been some whose interest has been 
largely morbidness, there have been some callous, self- 
centered hearts that have not suffered in the suffer- 
ing of the world, there have been some unimaginative 
minds that have felt no hurt. Most of us, too, now 
find less of shock in tales of fresh miseries, for we have 
had so much of it that our minds are getting stupefied 
and our sensibilities benumbed. And we do not stop 
to individualize in our thinking as we did at first, there 
is so much suffering in the mass. But, making all reser- 
vations, it is still true that the Christian world is to- 
day sympathizing as it never sympathized before. It 
is learning a new experience not only of a fellowship 
in joy but yet more of a fellowship in suffering. 

And well it may. For never did the pall of tragedy 
hang so heavy or so low over the whole of human 
life. If it were a case of outraged, bleeding Belgium 
alone there would be misery enough to make these 
years memorable in human history. But others of the 
smaller nations have been suffering as much. Think 
of Servia, hungry and plague smitten, her men carried 
off, her women and children left in anxiety and want. 
Think of Armenia, struck down by a crime as dark 
as was ever written into history, her people all but 
wiped out and the remnant left in wretchedness. And 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 95 

there is Roumania. Pitiful tales have been coming from 
Roumania in recent months, tales of broken homes, 
and of suffering and privations, especially among the 
women, the aged, and the very young. And Poland. 
'Tut all the sufferings of Armenia, of Belgium and of 
Servia together," says Dr. Mott, "and in my judgment 
they would be engulfed by the sufferings of Poland 
and the related regions." We might name, too, Tur- 
key and Persia, Montenegro and Lithuania and other 
small nations afflicted and brought low because of the 
War. And upon the stronger nations, as well, the 
stroke has fallen heavily. Eight million graves could 
tell how heavily. The hospitals and the prison camps 
throw their toll of misery into the cup of gall and 
wormwood which this generation is drinking. The 
evil of the hour is felt in quivering flesh. And, as a 
speaker just back from visiting many of the stricken 
countries said a few days ago, "There is not only the 
physical suffering of the wounded and diseased, but 
there is that dull, unceasing pain ever present in the 
consciousness of mothers, wives, sisters and little chil- 
dren." The shadows are lengthening across the face 
of the nations, and there is darkness in the homes of 
the world. No wonder there is today a climactic out- 
burst of human sympathy, for there never were so 
many hearts that held a fellow-feeling of pain and 
never so much of woe standing close about each life 
and out beyond each life, as far as knowledge can 
reach. 

Sympathy is crystallizing into deeds of mercy. 
Women are knitting, making comfort bags and rolling 



96 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

bandages, men are leaving their business to drive motor 
ambulances, actors and public speakers are contribu- 
ting their talent in the training camps and even within 
sound of the guns, women of wealth and social rank 
are serving in canteens, men at the head of large in- 
stitutions are over in France working with the Y. M. 
C. A., college women are rallying to the Red Cross, 
college men are doing service of a hundred kinds in 
cantonments and in the trenches. There is no leisured 
class in England. Canada has almost forgotten gaiety. 
The United States is beginning to lose her zest for fri- 
volity. 

Money, as well as time, is being poured forth at the 
call of sympathy. In Canada, in Great Britain, in 
France, in Australia and other countries there seems 
to be no limit to the public's capacity for giving. Fund 
after fund issues its special appeal every year and 
sometimes twice or more in a year. What would have 
been thought a fabulous sum in former days is set 
as a goal in each campaign, and seldom does the 
amount fail of oversubscription. For the springs of 
liberality that before sent out trickling streams are now 
pouring out torrents of supply for those who are suf- 
fering from the War. The United States is likely to 
prove worthy of a place beside these other nations. 
Last year, according to a computation which Dr. Mott 
has made, $330,000,000 was^ 9ontributed for philan- 
thropic objects connected with the War.i That amount 
does not seem proportionately very large considered as 

^ Not including denominational gifts for war purposes nor 
amounts contributed for Armenian and Syrian Relief. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 97 

but $3.30 per capita, but it was ten times as much 
as the United States had ever given before in any one 
year for similar purposes. College men and women 
are this winter giving to the Students' Friendship War 
Fund in amounts that register generosity and often a 
real sacrifice. There are many instances of students 
giving up a trip, a home Christmas, a set of furs, an 
overcoat, a pet indulgence, in order to make goodi a 
liberal subscription to the Fund. 

Hiding her own sorrow, Canada has looked about for 
the greatest needs to which she might direct her gen- 
erosity. The United States has shown equal discrim- 
ination and ingenuity in locating the urgent necessities 
of the hour at home and abroad. Neither nation 
wishes to leave unmet any conditions produced by the 
War which demand relief.^ 

iThe range covered by the ninety-two war relief organ- 
izations which, according to the National Service Handtx)ok, 
existed in the United States in 1917, can be seen from the 
titles of a very few of them : American Aid for Homeless Bel- 
gian Children; American Committee for Armenian and Sy- 
rian Relief; American Fund for French Wounded; Blue Cross 
Fund for Wounded Horses; Bulgarian Relief Committee; 
Committee for ReHef of Jews Suffering through the War; 
General Italian Relief Committee; Irish Relief Fund; Mon- 
tenegrin Relief Association of America; Permanent Blind 
War Relief Fund; Polish Victims Relief Fund; Roumanian 
Relief Committee; Secours National Fund for Relief of 
Civilian War Sufferers in France; Russian War Relief Com- 
mittee; Serbian Relief Committee; Siberian Regiments 
American Ambulance Society; Ukrainian War Relief Fund; 
Vacation War Relief Committee; Zionist Medical Unit, not 
to speak of many similar undertakings and the efforts made 
by various churches as such. 



98 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

It is an eloquent list. But for the United States it is 
only a beginning. As the iron enters more deeply into 
her own soul she will have a yet more tender heart for 
the sufferings of others. The horizon of her sympa- 
thies will widen. Her comradeship in disaster with 
a score of other nations will develop a keener con- 
science for the relief of their needs. 

A large part of the money raised has been sent over- 
seas. This is the most significant part of the story. 
For neither Canada nor the United States in previous 
years had been very alert to discover and respond to 
the needs that lay beyond their own borders. How 
slow they have been to give for the relief of needs that 
are remotely located from them, has often been demon- 
strated in recent years. We think of the United States 
and Canada together in this connection, for they are 
more than neighbors; their nervous system is one. 
When San Francisco was desolated by an earthquake, 
there was a rush of sympathy on both sides of the line 
to relieve the distress. But when Guatemala City was 
well-nigh destroyed by an earthquake on December 30, 
1917, resulting in 2,5(X) casualties and 125,000 made 
homeless, the affair was barely mentioned among us, 
and little was done by the American or Canadian public 
to lessen the suffering. 

On December 6, 1917, a Belgian relief ship rammed 
a French munition ship in Halifax harbor. The result- 
ing, explosion laid a large part of the city in ruins. The 
loss of life reached the appalling total of between 1,200 
and 1,500. Many were injured, including 300 children 
who were bhnded by flying shrapnel. Fire and blizzard 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 99 

added to the suffering. The news of the tragedy was 
flashed over the wires, and from all over the continent 
there were flashed back messages of sympathy and 
promises of help. Funds were opened in every city of 
consequence. Ships and trains were rushed to the spot 
with supplies. It was a magnificent display of large- 
heartedness. About two months before, on the night of 
September 30th, a typhoon struck the shores of Japan 
costing 1,619 lives and destroying property worth sev- 
eral million yen. The total casualties amounted to 
2,500. In Tokyo alone more than 100,000 homes were 
flooded. It was a more awful disaster by far than the 
one at Halifax. Yet few, if any, funds were opened 
in North America to send relief to the Japanese suf- 
ferers. They were too far removed from' our own 
homes. 

But happily, in the light of other indications, the les- 
son is being learned "that it is competent for a nation 
to give money away to other nations." This augurs 
well for the future. For it represents the most un- 
selfish form of a nation's benevolence. It is the mis- 
sionary type of giving. 

The value of this generous uprising of practical sym- 
pathy is great out of proportion to the immediate relief 
afforded. It is reacting upon our own life in the en- 
richment of character. It is developing an unselfish 
concern for other lives, even for those that are set 
down far from our own. It is creating, at least tem- 
porarily, the habit of giving in behalf of others whom 
we have never seen, who are across the world from us, 
and whose only claim upon us is their own distress. 



100 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

And it is a tangible expression of international obliga- 
tion, an evidence that we are gradually coming to rec- 
ognize the oneness of humanity and that, however re- 
moved we may be by distance or any other form of 
separation from a people, the moment they fall in need 
we are ready to treat them as our neighbors. It is the 
Good Samaritan practice, elevated to international 
terms. 

But what will happen to these widely awakened sym- 
pathies when the clouds of war have passed over and 
the sun breaks out again upon the world? It cannot 
be long until the sufferings caused by the War begin 
to diminish and the wrongs that immediately caused 
it are mitigated or removed. Shall these splendid sym- 
pathies, capable of sustained sacrifice and of an in- 
ternational outreach, become dormant again? Shall 
they call in their farther horizons and limit their min- 
istrations? To lose this one among the few finest 
products of the War that has taken away so much 
from us would be a tragedy indeed. Canon S. Gould, 
of Toronto, says: "By the war, capacities in danger 
of inundation by prosperity have been rescued ; moral 
fibers attached by the rot of indulgence have been re- 
tempered; splendid qualities of sacrifice and service 
have been aroused and exhibited on an unparalleled 
scale. All these gains, and others, must be sustained and 
perfected by some great implementing factor, whose 
root has no connection with human frailty or passion." 

Where are we to look for this "implementing fac- 
tor" ? Are we able to find wrong and sadness and dis- 
tress in the wide world vast enough to bid for the full 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 101 

measure of that sympathy which is now going out to 
the sufferings caused by the War ? The sorrowful fact 
is that out through the non-Christian nations before 
ever the War began, there was more of tragedy, more 
of horror and misery than the War has brought into 
the world. It was so ten and twenty and fifty years 
before that; it is so today, and yet, God help us, we 
have not realized it up to this time. It is only a half 
justification to say that we did not know, for the facts 
have been abundantly and graphically laid before us 
and we have had every right to know. But let us not 
waste time in recrimination of ourselves. Let us re- 
pent and set ourselves to good works in a fashion to 
atone for past neglects. After the War we shall find 
much to do for war-swept nations across the water 
that will have to be rehabilitated. But the only equiv- 
alent that we shall find for the destitution and agony 
and despair caused by the War is the overwhelming 
mass of human need throughout the non-Christian 
world. Does this sound like over-statement? Can it 
be that through all these years the greater part of the 
earth's population has been in so desperate a plight? 
Let us take a rapid glance across the needs of the 
less favored nations of the world. 

II. The Greatest Appeal for Sympathy Comes from 
the Need of the Non-Christian Nations. 

As we consider the needs of the non-Christian na- 
tions let us rid our minds of every condescension, every 
false sense of superiority. Essentially, potentially, the 
West cannot claim superiority to the East. The liber- 



102 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

ating principles of Christianity came first to the West- 
ern nations, and they got a few centuries start of their 
sister nations of the East. But the lead is being rapidly 
cut down since the ideals and methods of Western 
progress have been adopted by the Orient. They learn 
rapidly yonder and they are not servile imitators by any 
means. They have still much to learn from the West 
and the West is due to learn a great deal from the East. 
Education has come to but a small minority of the 
Eastern populations, aside from Japan, but from among 
the educated group there have arisen finished scholars, 
keen financiers, astute statesmen, brilliant men of let- 
ters and of science, towering personalities in all de- 
partments of human leadership. Most of the basic ele- 
ments of strength in Western peoples are possessed 
in common by those of India, China and Japan. And 
there are racial qualities in each of those peoples that 
Anglo-Saxons may well covet. There are great foun- 
dations to build upon. The closest students of the 
African peoples, not only in the North but in Central 
and Southern Africa, never tire in reminding us of the 
large capacities which are yet undeveloped in them, 
but which will one day come into evidence. And when 
we turn from non-Christian mission lands to those of 
Latin America, we come at once upon latent human re- 
sources that in many men have flowered into ripe cul- 
ture, high leadership and mighty achievement. Into 
the Church of Jesus Christ every one of these peoples 
will yet bring its own rich and needed contribution. 
As we survey the needs of these nations, therefore, let 
us do so on a basis of essential equality and with a 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 103 

just and grateful recognition of the possibilities, im- 
mense and distinctive, that inhere in each of them. 

First, let us remember that some of the most acute 
suffering caused by the War has been in mission lands. 
It is as painful for a Senegalese to be gassed as for a 
Frenchman. A blinded Turk is as pathetic a figure 
as a blinded Scotchman, and his family will suffer as 
much as the family of the other. A Fijian orphan is as 
much to be pitied as a Canadian orphan, and the widow 
of a Sikh as the widow of an American. Some of the 
mission countries, as has been pointed out already, are 
or have been battle areas. In Turkey proper, destitu- 
tion and disease are widespread. Persia has been 
overrun and her sufferings are acute. In four parts of 
pagan Africa war raged furiously and wrought its de- 
vastations. Homes were broken up, families separated, 
villages destroyed. Also in all of these countries liv- 
ing costs have become painfully high. 

But Western Asia has suffered the most. Harrow- 
ing and numerous as are the tales of suffering among 
Armenians, Syrians and Greeks, only a small part of 
the terror, the agony and distress has yet been recorded. 
Deportation has been wholesale. Arnold J. Toynbee 
says that "only a third of the two million Armenians 
in Turkey have survived, and that at the price of 
apostatising to Islam or else of leaving all they had 
and fleeing across the frontier. The refugees saw 
their women and children die by the roadside, and 
apostacy, too, for a woman, involved the living death 
of marriage to a Turk and inclusion in his harem. 
The other two-thirds were Reported' — that is, they 



104 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

were marched away from their homes in gangs, with 
no food or clothing for the journey, in fierce heat and 
bitter cold, hundreds of miles over rough mountain 
roads. Parched with thirst, they were kept away 
from' the water with bayonets. In lonely places the 
guards and robbers fell upon them and murdered 
them in batches — some at the first halting place after 
the start, others after they had endured weeks of this 
agonizing journey. About half the deportees — ^and 
there was at least 1,200,000 of them in all — perished 
thus on their journey, and the other half have been 
dying lingering deaths ever since at their journey's 
end." 

Many instances of the terrible torture inflicted on 
these unfortunate people are related in the Bryce re- 
port, such as the following, vouched for by a German 
eye-witness : "Every officer boasted of the number he 
had personally massacred. In Harpout the people have 
had to endure terrible tortures. They have had their 
eyebrows plucked out, their breasts cut off, their nails 
torn off. Their torturers hew ofif their feet or else 
hammer nails into them just as they do in shoeing 
horses. When they die, the soldiers cry : 'Now let your 
Christ help you.' " 

In the past two years not less than one million Ar- 
menians and Syrians in Turkey have perished as a 
result of massacre, deportation, exposure, starvation 
and disease. For the most part massacre and deporta- 
tion have ceased, but from the other causes named, 
deaths continue to multiply. "A hard task is assigned 
the missionaries, that of practically signing the death 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 105 

sentence of children. For example, in one case, there 
were 430 children with funds sufficient for only sev- 
enty. The missionaries were forced to select the sev- 
enty and say no to the equally or possibly more des- 
titute 360." In the Lebanon district alone it was 
reported recently that sufferers were dying at the rate 
of 1,000 a day. 'Tittle children scarcely able to feed 
themselves live absolutely alone in deserted homes." 
In all, over two million Armenians and Syrians are 
homeless and destitute and of this number some 400,- 
000 are orphans. Talk about rehabilitation! For a 
long period after the War is over these heroic sufferers 
will be struggling to mend their bodies, restore their 
homes, and build up the waste places of their country. 
Western Christians will find there a rare opportunity 
to fulfil the law of Christ" by bearing their burdens. 

These are needs occasioned by the War. But there 
are other needs that are perennial and normal in the 
non-Christian nations. Let us glance swiftly at some 
of these needs. 

1. Poverty is one of them. Every non-Christian 
land is poor. A day laborer in India when work is to 
be had receives less than ten cents a day and the aver- 
age yearly income per capita in the whole of India is 
tinder ten dollars. In China the unskilled laborer earns 
from ten to twenty cents per day. The average daily 
earnings .of the Latin American peon amount to eigh- 
teen cents. The causes of widespread poverty in non- 
Christian lands vary somewhat in different countries. 
They include poor agricultural methods (while the pop- 
ulations depend mainly on agriculture), priest-craft, 



106 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

improvidence and the prevalence of debt, caste, over- 
crowding, lack of industries, exploitation, land tenure ^ 
and hoarding. Famines, unknown in Christian lands, 
are common in non-Christian lands. It is safe to say 
that there is famine in some part of Asia all the tim.e. 
Five millions perished in India during the famine of 
1900. 

The non-Christian world is hungry. We have been 
solicitous for the hungry in Belgium and Poland during 
the present emergency. But more people have been 
suffering from the pangs of hunger in India than in 
Belgium and Poland combined. This has not been due 
to war conditions, but has been going on for ages. 
Why have we not been solicitous about them? It is 
estimated that in Asia and Africa more than 200,000,- 
000 always go to bed with hunger unsatisfied. We 
rightly pity the unsheltered refugees from Armenia 
and Poland, but have we the same pity for the 100,000,- 
000 who, according to Bishop Thoburn, sleep without 
shelter every night in China, India and Africa? The 
mission lands of the world are bitterly poor. Their 
foundations of sound economics have yet to be laid. 

2. The non-Christian lands are physically afflicted. 
They are disease smitten countries. They have all the 
diseases that are common among us and many that 
rarely or never are to be found in the Western 
lands of Christendom. Epidemics are the rule, and 
often they run their course unchecked. Cholera, 
tuberculosis, sleeping sickness, plague, smallpox, meas- 

1 In Latin America five per cent of the people own ninety- 
five per cent of the land. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 107 

les, yellow fever and malaria take their terrible toll 
in millions every year. In Africa, in India, in China 
and great sections of Latin America there is almost 
no knowledge of sanitation or hygiene. Immorality 
spreads its pitiful suffering and scars across the non- 
Christian world. Accidents and resulting infection are 
more common than with us. Native quackery and su- 
perstition add to the horror. In China and elsewhere 
filthy needles are plunged into the joints or the abdo- 
men to release the evil spirits, which perchance are 
rheumatism and acute indigestion. It is the women 
and little children who suffer most. Taking into ac- 
count undernourishment, harmful diet, overcrowding, 
child marriages, the inherited results of immorality, the 
drinking of foul water and many other causes, need 
we wonder that none but the very strong infants sur- 
vive? And the women, how tragic is their suffering 
in every land where Christ has not come ! Our hearts 
are very tender towards the physical agony caused by 
the wounds of battle and the diseases from which the 
troops are suffering. Should they be kss tender 
towards this vast suffering which is chronic in the non- 
Christian world? 

What makes the matter so serious is that there is lit- 
tle relief at hand. The swarming tribes of Africa have 
access to very few doctors or nurses. In China great 
areas can boast of but one physician to every three 
million people. In the medical profession there, an 
exclusive field of one million is quite a usual thing. 
In India, where nine-tenths of the people live in vil- 
lages. Dr. W. J. Wanless estimates that ''ninety out of 



108 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

every hundred who die in the smaller villages die un- 
attended by a qualified, or even partially qualified phy- 
sician." When we hear the clang of the ambulance 
gong, when we look at the brass plate by our doctor's 
door, when we see the colored lights of the drug store 
window, and think of all the relief that these represent, 
should we not feel a stab of pity for the millions upon 
millions to whom hospitals and ambulances, doctors 
and dispensaries are total strangers ? Our soldiers suf- 
fer in spite of ambulance corps, doctors. Red Cross 
nurses and every facility for comfort. The greater 
physical suffering of the non-Christian world is for 
the most part unrelieved. 

Here is a blind soldier back from the War. Our 
hearts go out to him. But over there, there are mil- 
lions 1 of blind, many of whom could be easily cured, 
and there are few to pity or mitigate their distress. 
Here is a soldier who has lost his hand or his foot in 
action. We honor him and we pity him and we help 
him, if we can. But over yonder in a bazaar street sits 
a leper with both hands and both feet rotted away, 
dying literally by inches. Why are we not as ready 
to hear a call for pity and help in his behalf ? Accord- 

1 Mr. W. C. B. Purser says regarding the 440,000 blind and 
the 200,000 «!eaf-mutes in India, "In several provinces of 
India these tv;o classes of unfortunates are wholly untouched, 
while in the other provinces they are quite inadequately pro- 
vided for by Christian missionary agencies." ("India's In- 
firmities." The East and the West, July, 1917, p. 298.) Only 
about 300 blind are receiving instruction in the mission schools 
of India. Similar conditions prevail in other non-Christian 
countries. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 109 

ing to the 1911 Census Report there are 109,000 lepers 
in India. Apart from the 5,000 whom Christian mis- 
sionaries have been able to gather into asylums, this 
pathetic group is almost totally uncared for. The same 
is true of the lepers of Japan and China, not to speak 
of Siam, Central Asia and other non-Christian lands. 
Almost nothing is being done for their relief, nor for 
the hundreds of thousands of insane and deaf-mutes 
in mission countries. 

The touch of Western civilization is adding its grow- 
ing quota each year to the physical misery of these 
lands. It spreads the hideous diseases of immorality. 
Multitudes of men from Western lands, having left 
moral restraints behind them, have scattered their 
vices among non-Christian peoples. Mr. Kipling de- 
scribes their attitude bluntly: 

Ship me somewheres East of Suez, 
Where the best is like the worst. 

Where there ain't no Ten Commandments, 
And a man can raise a thirst. 

And the same is true South of Suez. But south and 
east, the inexorable law of God's righteousness isi at 
work. Along the highways of communication with 
the non-Christian world and back into the interior 
there is to be found the physical wastage, Anglo- 
Saxon, Oriental, African, that has followed the defi- 
ance of the moral law. 

Modern industry is bringing along its accidents, its 
overwork and underpay, its unsanitary factories and 
crowded living quarters, its child labor and its occu- 
pational diseases and is intensifying the physical suf- 



no THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

f ering of the non-Christian "world. We are becoming 
more and more concerned over the physical effects of 
industry in our own nations. But is tuberculosis less 
serious for a girl in a Tokyo silk mill ^ than in a sweat- 
shop in New York ? Is it any more right that a child 
of ten should do a hard day's work or a hard night's 
work at a loom in Shanghai than in a cotton mill in 
Alabama? Are the morals of a factory in Canton, 
Ohio, a more precious consideration than the morals 
of a factory in Canton, China ? Shall we have *'saf ety 
first" in Canadian industries and safety last in the 
industries of Africa? 

3. Naturally, where there Is so much of deadly dis- 
ease, so little of sanitation and hygiene, and so few 
agencies of relief, the death rate is appalling. "In 
most Oriental towns the death rate is estimated at over 
45 per 1,000 ... in Bombay the infant death rate was 
593 per 1,000." 2 Infant mortality in the large cities 
of Latin America is very high. In Santiago, for ex- 
ample, four-fifths of the children die before they are 
five years of age. Preventable disease brings a St. Bar- 
tholomew's Eve to the children of mission lands every 
day. The deaths from preventable causes in India 
are said to total 5,000,000 every year, or more than the 
number of soldiers who were killed in action or died 



1 Dr. Sidney Gulick says that "Government statistics show 
that out of every one hundred girls to enter upon factory 
work in Japan, twenty-three die within one year of their 
return to their homes, and of these fifty per cent die of tuber- 
culosis." 

2 Elma K. Paget, "The Claim of Suffering," p. 34. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED HI 

from wounds and disease in the first two years of the 
War. More people are said to die as a result of witch- 
craft in Africa every year ^ than were killed in all the 
armies during the first year of the War. If the War 
should end within a year., the number of lives lost as 
its direct result will be much smaller than the number 
of deaths from preventable causes in non-Christian 
lands in any year. Add to these the unpreventable 
deaths and we have a total of 33,000,000 who die each 
year without a knowledge of Christ. 

4. The non-Christian world neglects its childhood. 
"In nothing does Christianity shine more resplendent 
by contrast," says Professor Alva W. Taylor, "than 
in its treatment of children, and in its claims of natu- 
ral right for them. . . . The only relief for the child 
life of heathenism is the new valuation of life which 
Christianity brings." ^ To anyone who has admired 
the beauty and brightness and winsomeness of the 
children of mission lands, the hideous crimes that are 
committed against childhood in those countries seem 
incredible. But people who have lived among them 
know that these evil things are only too true. Many 
children do not live who ought to live. Infanticide 
is one of the horrors of the non-Christian world.^ 



1 See article by George Heber Jones in World Outlook, 
March, 1915, p. 9. 

2 "The Social Work of Christian Missions," pp. 93-98. 

3 Sometimes this is due not to cruelty or lack of affection, 
but to poverty. In times of famine, for example, some parents 
prefer to end a child's life rather than condemn it, as they 
fear, to a life of suffering. 



112 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

The days of the Juggernaut are passed and seldom is a 
girl child thrown into the Ganges, for the British law 
has forbidden these evils. But of the children in 
India the majority of boys is large, which cannot mean 
less than that they are better safeguarded and nour- 
ished in infancy than are the infants who are unfor- 
tunate enough to be girls. In China girl babies are 
sometimes killed, although under the new regime this 
is illegal. In Africa some of the tribes kill all twin 
babies, and most tribes do away with all infants that 
are deformed. In at least one tribe every first-born 
child that is a girl is thrown into the woods to die. 
We have already referred to the neglect and ignorance 
in the care of infants and the evils of native malprac- 
tice that result in an appalling fatality. The wonder 
is that so many survive. 

In the early childhood of those who do survive there 
is for most of them a good deal of happiness, and they 
are really loved in their homes. But their lot is far 
from enviable and they, the girls especially, are not 
prized as they are in Christian families. Some of them 
are sold. In Afghanistan, daughters are sometimes 
known to be traded for cattle. Girls of thirteen in 
Siam are often offered for sale as serfs. In times 
of famine in China, Dr. Taylor says that "little chil- 
dren are sold for a few shillings, and it is no uncom- 
mon sight to see the bodies of little girls exposed at 
the riverside." ^ A recent writer says that "as many 
as 1,000 Chinese girls, who had been sent south to 



i"The Social Work of Christian Missions," p. 95. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 113 

be sold as slaves, pass through the Yangtse port of 
Ichong in a single year." ^ 

But with the girls in mission lands, childhood soon 
comes to an end, for they are married at an early age. 
In India, one girl out] of every eight is married be- 
tween the ages of five and nine, and in most parts of 
that country, few girls beyond the age of thirteen 
are unmarried. Girls in Moslem lands are almost all 
married before the age of fourteen, and those in Siam 
before the age of thirteen. In the years when these 
little girls should be spending their days in lightheart- 
edness, in school and at play, they are burdened with 
the cares of wifehood and motherhood. "It is almost 
impossible to exaggerate the physical evils of child 
marriage.'* 

We are distressed, and well we may be, over the 
condition of homeless Belgian children and the Arme- 
nian child refugees. But should we not be more 
deeply distressed over the vast multitude of children 
in non-Christian lands whose normal condition is even 
more piti-f ul ? Look at this Korean lad. The scars on 
his head and body show where hot irons have seared 
his flesh to let out the evil spirits of sickness. This 
sad little Indian mite is a widow. She is only ten years 
old, but her days of happiness are over. She is the 
drudge in her deceased husband's home and is the 
prey of evil men. This other little Indian girl was 
a beautiful innocent child the other day. But her face 
is already hard and the lustre has gone from her eye. 
She has been 'married to the god' and now is a tem- 

^ Missionary Review of the World, July, 1916, p. 552. 



114 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

pie girl. The gross sensual looking man yonder is 
the priest of the temple. Here is a little Moslem girl. 
She is being trained to be the servant and pla3rthing 
of the man whom she is to share with other wives. 
Like millions of her sisters, she is uneducated and her 
mind is filled with the gossip and vile stories of the 
harem in which she has been brought up. This Chinese 
girl is walking with pitiful short steps because of her 
crushed, bound feet. She belongs to one of the sec- 
tions of the country where the cruel practice has not 
been abandoned. They have a saying in China that 
"there is a pail of tears for every bound foot." And 
see this group of pallid, heavy-eyed Japanese girls, old 
before their time, coming out with dragging footsteps 
through the doors of the silkmill. They have been 
standing by their machines all through the night, for 
twelve long hours. The stockades yonder enclose the 
factory dormitories where the girls will spend most of 
the next twelve hours, in conditions that are unspeak- 
able. All of these are types. The conditions they 
represent are crimes against childhood. They are not 
the havoc suddenly produced by an emergency, but 
are standing conditions in non-Christian lands. 

5. The non-Christian world degrades its woman- 
hood. There is a mistaken notion that every woman 
in mission countries is oppressed and unhappy. 
This is far from being true, for many of them are 
loved and kindly treated by their husbands. But the 
orthodox view of women that is held in general 
throughout the non-Christian world reduces her to an 
inferior order of beings, and the crimes against worn- 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 115 

anhood are second only to those against childhood as 
social enormities. It is prevailingly true in mission 
lands that the ignorance among women is much greater 
even than among men. The sphere of woman is char- 
acteristically one of narrow servitude. She is con- 
demned in many cases to do the work of animals, the 
heaviest and most disagreeable forms of work. She 
is a drudge in the fields, in the factories, in the home, 
She is secluded in Hindu zenanas and Mohammedan 
harems. The binding of her feet in China is symbolic 
of the cramping of her interests. She has no mem- 
ories of glad years of adolescent girlhood. She mar- 
ries young, and suffers the results of it for the rest of 
her life. 

Among Mohammedans polygamy is very common. 
The Koran allows a man to have four wives and as 
many concubines ''as his right hand can hold," i. e., as 
he can afford. What this entails of degradation, jeal- 
ousy, friction and acute suffering is beyond human 
language. Unlimited divorce is another evil of Islam 
that falls heavily on womanhood. A writer in The 
Moslem World ^ tells of a youth who was reproved 
for taking a twenty-eighth wife and who replied, 
"Why should I not, when my father divorced thirty- 
eight ?" This is, of course, an extreme case, but offi- 
cial records in Egypt show that out of every seven 
women married more than two are divorced. This 
understates the case, as many divorces are not officially 
recorded. 

The condition of Hindu widows is the last word in 
the degradation of womanhood. A curse is upon the 

* Issue of January, 1913, pp. 64-65. 



116 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

widow, since blame for her husband's death is ascribed 
by some vague connection to her evil influence. She 
is permanently disgraced. Her hair cut off, her ward- 
robe taken from her, save one garment, she is con- 
demned to drudgery and perhaps to infamous treat- 
ment, in the home of his family or else is cast back as 
a burden upon her own. She can never remarry, for 
she belongs to her husband forever ! More than 100,- 
000 of these widows are under ten years of age, and 
over 1,000 of them are not yet one year old. Our 
compassions are going out to the unfortunate women 
who have been made widows by the War. But if 
every married soldier under arms today were to be 
killed, all the widows that would be left in the world 
would not suffer a tithe of what India's 26,000,000 
widows are suffering now. Why have not our com- 
passions gone out to them long ago? This condition 
has existed in India for ages. 

What a tragedy the War has wrought in broken 
homes ! But should they excite a greater pity than the 
vast populations which by reason of the status to which 
they have assigned womanhood have never known the 
meaning of a true home and which have not even a 
word to signify "home" in our common understanding 
of the term ? Our sense of chivalry has been outraged 
by the treatment which Armenian, Servian and other 
women have suffered in recent months from their cap- 
tors. But where has our knightliness been that our 
wrath has not kindled at the indignities which women 
of Africa have been undergoing at the hands of men 
and at all these other wrongs from which womanhood 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 117 

in non-Christian lands has been suffering for centuries 
past ? 

6. The non-Christian world is ignorant and illiterate. 
It makes up the great bulk of the eighty per cent of 
humanity that can neither read nor write. Japan is 
now a literate nation, but of the other mission lands 
India would be a fair illustration to compare with 
Christian nations such as the United States. Accord- 
ing to the latest census reports, 94.1 per cent in India 
are illiterate, as against 6.5 per cent in the United 
States. In China an even larger percentage are illiter- 
ate. In Latin America the illiteracy ranges from forty 
per cent to over eighty per cent in the various republics. 
In Moslem lands. Dr. Zwemer estimates that with the 
exception of Turkey, from seventy-five to ninety per 
cent are not literate, while in pagan Africa, apart from 
the influence of the mission schools, the people do not 
even know that writing has ever been invented. Wo- 
manhood has been left in almost total ignorance. Even 
where boys have been given some education, few girls 
have been allowed to share it. Where education has 
come it has often proven ill-adapted to national and 
racial requirements. The government systems of edu- 
cation, where these exist, are found wanting by reason 
of their purely secular character. Even Japan, with 
its fine and exhaustive educational system, is today 
painfully aware of this deficiency. And now these 
nations have come to their time of transition. Now, 
if ever, they are needing, not only a soundly educated 
leadership, but an enlightened public mind. This adds 
urgency and pathos to the cry for education that comes 



118 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

up today out of the non-Christian nations. The greater 
part of that world is still sodden in ignorance and 
superstition, still shut out from the influences that 
liberate the mind, give meaning to the facts of life, 
make social emancipation and national progress pos- 
sible and lay solid foundations for democracy. 

7. The non-Christian world is a world of social op- 
pression. The great social cleavages and oppressions 
of mankind are to be found in the mission lands of 
the world. Slavery, which is the most flagrant form of 
social oppression, has not yet been rooted out of hu- 
man relationships. Instances of girls being sold into 
slavery by thousands have already been quoted. A 
writer in The Missionary Review of the World ^ says : 
"There is still much to be done to drive slavery 
out of Africa. . . . Something over 3,000 slaves, it is 
estimated, are imported into Morocco every year, most 
of them being brought by the terrible desert routes 
from Equatoria and the Sudan, the trails of the slave 
caravans being marked by the bleaching bones of the 
thousands. . . . Officials of the English branch of the 
Committee of Anti-Slavery and Aborigines Protective 
Society say it is admitted that slave owning, slave trad- 
ing, and great cruelty to native races are widely preva- 
lent throughout the tropical regions of South America 
and Mexico." 

There are other forms of oppression closely akin 
to slavery. Forced labor in Africa is resorted to not 
only for public undertakings but for private enter- 
prises as well, and as such is a near equivalent to sla- 

' Issue of April, 1914, pp. 245-246. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 119 

very. In Latin America peonage is "the dark shadow" 
of chattel slavery which is now prohibited by law. 
Professor Ross speaks of "the momentous, basic fact 
that from the Rio Grande down the West Coast to 
Cape Horn, free agricultural labor, as we know it, 
does not exist." ^ The laborer, unable to live on his 
trifling wages, is obliged to run into debt to the owner 
of the land. The debt accumulates until it is so large 
that it can never be worked off, and "the peon becomes 
virtually a serf bound to work all his life for a nominal 
wage. He can change employers only in case some one 
pays his debt and this binds him to a new master." 

The caste system in India presents another form of 
social oppression. The system has brought some ad- 
vantages to India, but they are meagre in proportion 
to its evils. It stratifies society into divisions and 
sub-divisions. Into whatever layer of society a man is 
born, there he must remain. He cannot improve his 
condition. He is bound hand and foot by his caste. 
He is forbidden to intermarry or even interdine with 
other castes. The caste system has limited co-opera- 
tion, produced discord, prevented progress, crushed 
initiative, developed artificiality, prevented true social 
conceptions and thrown the economic order out of 
joint. It is India's central problem.^ But we are here 
concerned with the fact that it has submerged a great 



IE. A. Ross, "South of Panama," p. 144. 

2 Of India's leaders, many are now crying out against caste 
as a national incubus that must be thrown off if India is 
really to become a force in the modern family of nations. 
Some reformers are willing to inter-dine with congenial men 



120 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

mass of the population. Down at the bottom of the 
scale are the Panchamas, the outcastes, or "untouch- 
ables." They may not enter Hindu temples, and usu- 
ally are obliged to live outside the villages. They are 
the dregs of Hindu society, and have no rights recog- 
nized by Hinduism. Their touch is polluting, in some 
places even their shadow falling upon one is reckoned 
a defilement. These 50,000,000 outcastes are the toil- 
ers of India, manual labor being thought degrading by 
the caste people, and they are abject, servile and on 
the borderland of starvation. Many of them, like the 
peons of Latin America, have fallen into debt to their 
landowners, and are little better than slaves. India's 
outcastes make a stronger claim upon our Christian 
sympathy than any other social group in the world. 

8. The non-Christian world is in moral need. Here 
especially we must caution ourselves against any com- 
placent attitude on the ground that we have recog- 
nized the lofty ethics of Jesus as our moral ideal. Let 
us humbly realize how far short we have fallen of 
attaining to it. It is easy to nail a flag to the mast. It 
is hard to fight for it. We must bear in mind, too, the 
fact that the ethical standards of different mission 
lands vary greatly. But speaking generally, the non- 
Christian world is in need of a great elevation of moral 
ideals. Much of the need which we have been discus- 



of other castes, and there have been a few cases of inter- 
marriage. Some societies have been formed for the uplift 
of the depressed classes. These and other progressive move- 
ments, such as those relating to education, child marriage, 
etc., are likely to be accelerated after the War. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 121 

sing in this chapter is due to deficient moral standards. 
Truer conceptions of right and wrong for the individ- 
ual and of the broader social requirements of morality 
would have obviated many of these evils. The pioneer 
missionaries, as they have entered each new field have 
been depressed by the moral atmosphere into which 
they have come. They have met with many excellencies 
and virtues, such as courtesy, hospitality, loyalty, 
filial devotion and certain codes of honor to which the 
people adhered. But they have found dishonesty, graft, 
governmental corruption, thievery, polygamy, impu- 
rity, injustice, cruelty, tyranny, slavery, infanticide, 
murder and cannibalism flourishing in their various 
communities with apparently little conscience against 
therti. They have sometimes written home that they 
could bear loneliness and deprivation and hardship with 
glad hearts, but that to breathe the stifling foul air 
of sin day and night was almost beyond endurance. 
As contacts gradually were established between these 
backward peoples and Western civilization, Western 
vices were more quickly learned than Western virtues, 
and the moral problem became complicated. It is not 
necessary for us here to enter upon a survey of the 
ethical needs of this non-Christian land and that. They 
are sufficiently well known to the reader to persuade 
him of the ethical deficiencies in all non-Christian na- 
tions. Moreover, some of these nations are today well 
aware of them. They are confessing, through their 
leaders, their great need of moral deliverance, and are 
setting themselves to efforts for reform. But the diffi- 
culty of the problem appears when we remember that 



122 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

the upheavals through which these nations are now 
passing are removing many of the old sanctions and 
customs which had a certain restraining and directing 
moral value, and apart from Christianity are providing 
nothing to take their place. 

9. The non-Christian world is in religious need. If 
back of all the other problems and needs of the non- 
Christian nations we find a moral issue, back of the 
moral problem again we come to the ultimate question 
of religion. The view men have of God and the hu- 
man soul's relation to God determines their view of sin 
and their determining of moral standards. 

But the religious need of the non-Christian world is 
not only a vital factor in all the aspects of need that 
we have been reviewing. It is in itself the greatest 
and most pitiable need of all. This mother in Cairo 
mourning the loss of her babe is to be pitied less be- 
cause she is bereft than because she is without hope. 
This pariah in India is badly off because he is op- 
pressed and hungry; but he is worse off because he 
does not know that he is a child of the Heavenly 
Father and of infinite worth in His eyes. This Japan- 
ese student is a pathetic figure because his heart is 
heavy over his moral failure ; but the greater pathos is 
in the fact that he is unaware that there is both pardon 
and power for him in Christ. It is the pathos of blind 
men dying of thirst within reach of water, but with 
none to tell them of it or lead them to it. The Mace- 
donian cry of the non-Christian world is most of all 
for a religion that will satisfy their deep cravings of 
the spirit, that will mitigate their present suffering and 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 123 

want and destroy at the roots all the social evils that 
press upon their life. 

III. Christianity Offers the Only Sufficient Relief for 
the Need of the Non-Christian World. 

We have made a long and oppressive catalogue of 
the needs which appear in the life of non-Christian 
peoples. They are needs which appear in individuals 
and in the whole fabric of corporate life, social, eco- 
nomic, governmental. How are they to be met ? Fun- 
damentally and ultimately they must be met by religion. 

The non-Christian religions are inadequate to bring 
relief. They have had their chance. Turkey is the 
answer to Mohammedanism, India is the answer to 
Hinduism, China to Confucianism, Japan to Buddhism. 
With no hindrance from outside factors, they have 
either produced the evils mentioned or have stood by 
in impotence and watched them develop. It is not 
that these religions have been destitute of high ideals. 
The failure has been in the inadequacy of even these 
ideals, and in the lack of religious dynamic for the 
attainment of them. Physical suffering abounded, and 
they could produce no scientific treatment nor adequate 
charity for its relief. Famines and pov-erty brought 
about unspeakable want, but they could not cope with 
economic problems nor develop a heart of sympathy 
that would minister to need. They might be solicitous 
not to destroy the life of an insect, and even build hos- 
pitals for animals, but would view with callousness 
the loss of thousands of human lives. Rarely, if ever, 
have they of their own impulse put up a hospital, an 



124 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

asylum or an orphanage. They might worship a cow, 
but they would degrade and debase their women. 
They might multiply religious observances and receive 
thousands of dollars for the wedding of a pair of 
sacred monkeys, but they would have no concern for 
daughters that were sold in marriage. They might 
set a great glitter upon religious ceremonial, but they 
would not see the beauty and glory and possibilities of 
childhood. They might write a mass of sacred litera- 
ture, but they would wink at duplicity, lust and cruelty. 
They might set up a million shrines, but would carry 
immorality into the very temples of religion. They 
might mutilate human bodies in ascetism, but would 
utter no protest against social injustice that pressed 
the life blood out of the poor and weak. They might 
even set up moral codes and write exalted precepts 
into them, but they would not, because they could not, 
offer a spiritual power that would make high morality 
possible. Yes, and they might crowd their pantheons 
with many gods, but they could furnish none that was 
worthy of the trust and obedience of men. They could 
teach devotees to fear and flee from the deities they 
worshipped, but none to come close to them in love. 
They could teach the words, O Great Spirit, O Allah, 
O Swami, O Lord Buddha, but not the words, Our 
Father. 

Into this world of spiritual impotency and destitu- 
tion Jesus Christ comes, and at once He begins to 
prove His sufficiency to meet the utmost needs of in- 
dividual human life. For religious formalism He sub- 
stitutes reality. For fatalism and a materialistic view 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 125 

of life He substitutes a spiritual conception of the uni- 
verse; for darkened minds, enlightenment; for loneli- 
ness and despair, His own friendship and assurance; 
for a hopeless outlook into the life beyond, the sure 
.promise of immortality; for an inferior ethical ideal, 
divorced from religion, a supreme moral standard that 
finds all its sanctions in religion. 

The perfect adequacy of Jesus Christ to meet not 
only individual requirements but the whole range of 
social and national need has been proven in every land 
to which He has been taken. He has gone with a fel- 
low feeling of their wrongs and sufferings. 

The other gods were strong; but Thou wast weak; 

They rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne; 
But to our wounds only God's wounds can speak. 

And not a god has wounds, but Thou alone. 

But not only has He brought a message of friendly 
sympathy and cheer; He has resolutely taken the prob- 
lems in hand. He has rid whole communities of de- 
basing practices. He has set down schools and colleges 
in all these lands to remove ignorance and superstition, 
and as minds became educated He has furnished them 
with Christian Scriptures and other uplifting literatufe. 
He has displaced a callousness to human suffering by 
a warm heart of tenderness, and has established or- 
phanages, asylums and hospitals to care for the suffer- 
ing and neglected. He has carried money to the in- 
digent and food to the hungry. He has taken the little 
children in His arms and shown how they should be 
preserved and developed. He has exalted woman from 



126 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

her low condition to a throne of power and dignity 
and sacred regard. He has estabhshed quiet, thrifty, 
well-ordered community life. He has taught men how 
to gain a better livelihood through new industries and 
improved agriculture. He has dignified labor and 
raised the standards of living. He has supplanted so- 
cial oppression by a sense of the infinite worth of each 
individual child of the Highest, and selfish individual- 
ism by a sense of corporate responsibility that makes 
all men keepers of all their brothers. He has initiated 
movements for political and social reform. He has 
checked disorder and class antagonism. He has 
brought a zeal for national progress and developed a 
capacity for it. He has produced a divine discontent 
with old institutions and customs and standards that 
were confining or perverting the powers of men, and 
has proposed for their acceptance new institutions and 
ideals and scales of value. He has instilled a passion 
for liberty and has prepared nations for the use of it. 
He has spread abroad His own emancipating princi- 
ples of democracy. 

And behind and through all this, He has brought to 
the non-Christian world a spiritual message. It is a 
message that announces the Fatherhood of God, the 
brotherhood, essential equality and mutual obligations 
of all men as brethren. It is a message that not only 
proclaims a high moral standard, but also furnishes the 
inner power whereby the standard may be attained. 
It is a message that takes into account the totality of 
human need, individual and social. It is a message 
that deals with all the issues of the present life and 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 127 

looks forward with hope and eagerness to the life 
beyond. 

These are things that He is actually doing today 
in non-Christian lands even as He has been doing them 
for ages in Western nations that were once non-Chris- 
tian. He is doing them through various instrumen- 
talities, but mainly through the agency of foreign mis- 
sions, evangelistic, humanitarian, medical, educational, 
literary and industrial. 

It is primarily through the missionary himself that 
Christ brings His life into the need of the non-Chris- 
tian world. He is more than Christ's herald. He is 
His representative. His executive, His agent. Through 
the missionary's lips the message of truth is spoken. 
By his life it is interpreted. By his activities it is ex- 
pressed in institutional forms and brought to bear upon 
the problems of the nation. The spread of the mis- 
sionary message is characteristically "a campaign of 
incarnation." That is what the world is supremely 
needing today, a flesh and blood manifestation of the 
friendly, loving spirit of Jesus Christ. Apart from 
a sufficient offering of qualified men and women who 
will forget self and go forth to the less favored peoples 
of the earth to incarnate Christ among them, the needs 
of the non-Christian world will never be met. 

But not alone are foreign missionaries required. 
There is need for a great body of Christian disciples in 
these lands which are the bases of supply for the out- 
going ministrations of Christianity who will make their 
own the needs of the non-Christian world. We can 
never bring ourselves to the place of true international 



128 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

brotherhood and service, we can never spread the 
Christian ideals of democracy, we can never be citizens 
of the world in the sense of those who see the whole 
world as potentially the topire of Christ, until we 
understand the vast needs of the nations now without 
Christ, sympathize with them deeply and act gener- 
ously for their relief. "This is a day when world 
measurements should be laid down on all our 
thoughts" ^ and upon all our feelings as well. 

We cannot sufficiently remind ourselves that in re- 
lieving these deep and intricate needs of the non-Chris- 
tian nations we are ministering to Christ Himself. 
What a privilege to travel round this blessed orbit of 
love from Christ to Christ ! If we are going to have 
anything worth sending out or taking in our own per- 
sons to the needs of mankind yonder, we must first go 
to Him to receive it from His own hands. He has all 
the supply that is required and the scars on His hands 
remind us How He obtained it. And as we go out 
with this precious freight of relief across the seas, 
we find Christ there. However far we penetrate across 
rivers and deserts into the regions beyond, if we come 
upon a human need we find that Christ has identified 
Himself with it. It is His need. It may be a Siamese 
leper by the wayside, it may be a hungry orphan boy 
in India whose father was killed over in France, it may 
be an Egyptian woman in a luxurious harem, it may be 
a Brahman student who finds his old faith slipping 
away, and who is struggling to find what will satisfy 
his religious life, it may be a little African girl who 

' "The Churches of Christ in Time of War,'' p. 105. 



CALL OF THE WORLD'S PRESENT NEED 129 

needs an education, it may be an injured Chinese coolie 
' — but it is His need. Inasmuch as we reHeve it, we 
reheve His suffering. We started out from Christ, we 
now come back to Him. We have compassed the 
golden circle of the love of God. 



CHAPTER V 

THE CALL FOR A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 

The world sweep of the obligations that inhere in 
Christian discipleship is one of the vivid revelations 
made by the War. These obligations carry us further 
than an appreciation of the present aggravated needs 
of the non-Christian nations. They lead us into a 
purpose and a program that will bring the resources 
that are in Jesus Christ to bear upon these needs in 
every part of the world. And, as we shall see, just 
because of the War's effects the purpose should be 
more whole-hearted and the program more aggressive. 
The words of Jesus do not sound more faintly as 
they travel down the centuries. The instructions He 
gave so clearly time and again after His resurrection 
that His message and His work should be spread 
throughout all the nations are heard with greater dis- 
tinctness today than at any time since the apostolic 
age. And apart from those explicit directions, we are 
catching in every great truth He uttered an implied 
direction for its propagation. What He said then is 
precisely what all the nations are needing to hear and 
accept today. Christians in larger numbers than ever 

130 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 131 

before are coming to understand that He always spoke 
in intention to a world audience, though His own 
voice carried to but a small circle, and that He pro- 
posed to use His disciples as reproducing instruments 
to the ends of the earth. In other words, the con- 
viction is spreading rapidly today that our religion 
is a universal religion, and that a universal religion 
is a missionary religion. And with this conviction 
there is the wonder that long ago the religion of our 
Lx>rd was not made universal in fact, at least in the 
sense of being announced to all mankind. Had that 
been accomplished, the world might not now be pass- 
ing through these agonizing years. We are to con- 
sider in this chapter whether the task should not now 
be completed, whether this generation of Christians 
should not carry the Gospel to its own generation of 
non-Christians. 

We do not wait for the timid or the selfish or the 
unbelieving to bring forward the difficulties involved. 
We face them frankly. The mere bulk of the task is 
overwhelming. There are more people in the world 
today to whom Christ has not been named than there 
ever were before. The populations of non-Christian 
lands are increasing more rapidly than converts are 
being made. One hundred and twenty-two millions 
of people are in lands that are not now occupied by 
any Protestant Christian worker, and are not even in- 
cluded in the plans of any missionary society.^ And 
in the areas that are occupied multitudes are un- 
reached. In Japan two-thirds of the population have 

1 World Missionary Conference Report, 1910, Vol. I, p. 283. 



132 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

yet to be evangelized. In China 1,557 walled cities 
are without any Christian worker. Five provinces of 
Mexico have not a single Protestant missionary. On 
the present basis of missionary effort, probably one- 
third of the people in the world today will die without 
hearing the Gospel of the Kingdom. To the colossal 
dimensions of the task and its staggering intensive 
difficulties, the new difficulties which have entered into 
the situation, and which were reviewed in a preceding 
chapter, must be added. We study the difficulties 
carefully, but we do not take counsel of them. A true 
soldier does not reckon up the risks involved, he car- 
ries out orders. A true Christian does not figure out 
the possibilities of success, he does his duty. This 
generation of Christians must not base its program on 
difficulties, it must meet its obvious responsibility. An 
impossible task? Well, if it is, the glory of its accom- 
plishment will be all the greater. 

Let us inquire into the reasons why this generation 
of Christians should undertake to meet their Lord's 
desire that His message should be given to the entire 
human family. 

I. IVar Conditions are Favorable to Missionary 
Expansion. 

Talk missionary expansion to some persons in war 
time and they promptly reply that this is the time to 
retrench. They say that Christians are not in a posi- 
tion now to meet the required cost. For their own 
part, the demands for gifts to philanthropic and patri- 
otic funds have multiplied so greatly that they have 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 133 

felt it necessary to transfer to these emergency needs 
the money they had previously been giving to mission- 
ary purposes. The fallacy of this reasoning borders 
on recreancy. The supplanting of one need by an- 
other as an object of financial help implies that there 
is a precise amount of money available with each in- 
dividual for unselfish uses, and that that exact and 
ultimate sum was already being expended. There are 
few who could honestly claim that this is the case. 
Still less is it the case that in the Church as a whole 
there is a measurable and definite amount available 
for missionary undertakings. 

What is more, the deflecting of money from mis- 
sionary purposes to some emergent benevolence does 
not represent one's own giving at all. Suppose a 
man's missionary contribution has been going to the 
support of an orphanage in China, and he suddenly 
stops that flow of money and turns it into a Red 
Cross channel. He is not the one to be thanked by 
the Red Cross. He has not added anything to his 
benevolent expenses. The only sacrifice has been in 
China where, unless some one else has taken up that 
giver's responsibility, part of the orphanage work was 
shut down. There is something cheap in his accept- 
ing credit for a generous benefaction, when the real 
sacrifice has been made not by him but by some little 
orphans in China. The requirements of missionary 
work and all other necessary enterprises in the years 
before the War are requirements still. "New occa- 
sions teach new duties." The energetic calls for 
money that the War has brought are calls for the 



134 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

enlarged practice of benevolence. They bring the op- 
portunity for real sacrifice and yet more sacrifice. The 
new calls must certainly be met and met so generously 
that every Christian, however wealthy, will be obliged 
to retrench at some points -in his usual outlays of 
money. But is the retrenchment to be made at the point 
of missionary expense ? Or is that item the one farthest 
removed from luxury in the budget of the Christian? 
There are others who, while they agree that the con- 
tinuing demands of foreign missions should not be 
eclipsed by anything emergent, contend that the best 
to be expected in the lean years of war is that exist- 
ing work should be maintained. The attention of 
Christians is preoccupied by the War, the numbers of 
our available men for missionary effort is now greatly 
reduced, and, with the increased cost of living. Chris- 
tians will do well if they maintain their present mis- 
sionary gifts. Let us keep the missionary flag flying, 
they say, but let us not for the present try to move 
it forward. At first glance this is perfectly reason- 
able. But, as we shall see later, attention and men 
and money are available for an advance. The War 
and the obligations it brings need not divert the at- 
tention of Christians from their missionary responsi- 
bilities, but may rather direct attention to those very 
duties; the securing of men for Christian service is 
not and never has been a numerical problem but one 
of devotion; the necessary supplies of money depend 
more on fullness of the heart than of the pocket. The 
present apparent deficiency in these respects should 
not hold us back for a moment. We cannot believe 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 135 

that the War or any of its effects can have modified 
the will of God that the world should be evangelized. 

The possibilities in the Christian Church for large 
and immediate missionary developments in the midst 
of the disturbances and hardships caused by War is 
not an academic question, for we have many a page 
of Church history to turn to for precedent. We dis- 
cover that most of the great missions^ advances in 
common with other forward movements in the moral 
and spiritual life of nations in modern times had their 
birth in times of war. It was in 1649, at the close 
of a great Civil War, that the first missionary society 
in England was founded under the name of "The Cor- 
poration for the Propagation of the Gospel in New 
England." ^ In 1701 the Society for the Propagation 
of the Gospel in Foreign Parts had its birth "in an 
interval between two long and exhausting wars in 
which Great Britain was engaged." 

During the period of the Napoleonic Wars the mod- 
ern missionary movement in Grteat Britain had its real 
beginning, some of the great missionary societies, such 
as the Church Missionary Society, the London Mission- 
ary Society and the Baptist Missionary Society, being 
formed between 1792 and 1804. In the latter year 
the British and Foreign Bible Society was founded. It 
was during the War of 1812 that the first missionaries 
were sent out by an American society. 

If we open our Church history at the period of the 

^It is interesting to note that this society was foiinded by 
the English ParHament under the advocacy of Oliver Crom- 
well. 



136 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

American Civil War, we read the story of another 
large missionary advance. At least one of the for- 
eign missionar}^ societies of the United States, that of 
the Southern Presbyterian Church, had its beginning 
in the midst of those difficult and exhausting years, 
and the other societies leaped into new activity. Dr. 
Robert E. Speer says that "the Christian conscience 
of the nation during the days of the Civil War saw 
in the generous outpouring of life at the call of the 
nation not a reason for exemption, but a ground of 
appeal in the matter of missionary service." "^ In 
France we have a similar record. In the period just 
following the Franco-Prussian War there was a large 
expansion of the work of both the Roman Catholic 
and Protestant missionary societies. 

Whether it has been due to the quickening of Chris- 
tian sympathies in time of war, the widespread exer- 
cise of the spirit of sacrifice, the purifying and dis- 
ciplining of the Church, or the special blessing of God 
upon the faith and devotion of the Christians who in 
such times were ready to move forward, the inspiring 
fact stands out that times of war have been times of 
missionary advance. Should it be otherwise now? 
It is the way of the brave and believing spirit to see 
in the very catastrophe of the hour an opportunity for 
the overruling power of God to be revealed for His 
world purposes. 

1 See "The Student Volunteer Movement : Record for 1916," 
by Fennell P. Turner, pages 19-20, for Dr. Speer's story of 
the missionary progress of one great church during and fol- 
lowing the Civil War. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 137 

On the whole, the missionary societies of Great 
Britain and Canada have held their ground in the past 
four years. Some have made substantial gains, besides 
clearing off large deficits. The Wesleyan Missionary 
Society in England and the Methodist Missionary 
Society in Canada had a larger income in 1916 than 
in any previous year. It is not surprising that some 
churches are now preparing for exceptional advances. 
The American Board, as part of its forward program, 
plans to place 110 new missionaries in Turkey as soon 
as the War is over. The Methodist Episcopal Church 
has already launched a movement that outstrips any 
missionary undertaking in the history of the Christian 
Church. It has set itself to a program of forward 
work which will involve the raising and expending 
of forty million dollars in the next five years, and the 
maintaining of its operations on this enlarged basis in 
the following years. This will mean that this one 
church proposes to give annually more than three 
times as much as it or any other Church in the United 
States or Canada has ever given in a year. It will 
mean that one strong section of the body of Christ 
will come measurably near to the evangelizing of its 
share of the world in this generation. It will not 
mean the neglecting of home needs; for this same 
Church plans to expend a corresponding amount upon 
its work in the United States. If every branch of the 
Christian Church would with equal deliberation and 
prayer fix upon a similar program,, each several share 
of the task of world evangelization would be assumed. 
Must we not beHeve that the Head of the Churcb 



138 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

would respond to this loyal adventure of faith and 
devotion by releasing such a tide of divine energy as 
has never yet swept through the windows of Heaven 
into the undertakings of men? 

IL We Must Make Good the D elinqiiencies of Pre- 
vious Generations. 

Why is the greater part of mankind still without 
the Gospel of Jesus Christ? It is not because of any 
limitations in the ability of any section of the human 
race to understand and receive the Christian message, 
nor in the ability of the Gospel to meet the full re- 
quirements of men in every age, nor in the eagerness 
of God to reveal it as His power unto salvation to 
the whole of human life throughout the world, nor, 
we beheve, in the conditions under which it would 
have been propagated in any previous time. It is be- 
cause of limitations which have been in the Church 
herself. We must remember that, as Dr. E. A. Law- 
rence puts it, the Church is ''the organ of the King- 
dom's expansion." It is doubtless true that if the 
Church had lived up to her possibilities in faith and 
sacrifice the world would have been evangelized long 
ago. The Christians of the early Church put forth a 
strong effort to evangelize the world, and, as Dr. 
Charles R. Watson points out^ nearly succeeded in do- 
ing so.^ But since then no generation of Christians 
has seriously undertaken its full duty to the Gospel and 
to the world, and meantime the task has kept growing 
even larger. We are heirs to countless benefits left 

^ God's Plan of World Redemption, chs. V, VI. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 139 

by the Christian generations that have preceded us, 
and we are also heirs to many deHnquencies. We are 
ready enough to accept the advantages that have come 
down to us. Shall we be slow to take up the obliga- 
tions we have inherited? As a Church we can secure 
no exemption from our present task on the ground that 
through the past negligence of the Church the under- 
taking has now assumed such discouraging propor- 
tions. Dr. Zwemer likens such a claim to that of the 
murderer who, after killing his father and mother, 
besought the court for mercy on the ground that he 
was an orphan. It is through the Church's neglect 
that the task is unfinished; it is for the Church now 
to redouble her energies and complete the task. 

Unfortunately there are many Christians who, with- 
out regard to the unique opportunities and demands 
of our day, would be quite content that we should at- 
tempt no unusual program for the spread of the 
Kingdom of Christ. They would not elevate this 
program to a war basis, calling for a new scale of 
idealism and sacrifice, of determination and energy. 
They would do an ordinary thing at an extraordinary 
time, and let the later generations deal with an in- 
crement of duty. They are willing that the Church 
should continue to live under the load of a large and 
increasing Standing Debt and be satisfied with occa- 
sional minor contributions to a Sinking Fund. Even if 
this easy-going procedure were not condemned by the 
burdens which it imposes on Christians of a later day, 
it is utterly condemned by the unspeakable loss to 
which it subjects those who will be unevangelized 



140 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

through all the generations until the task is done. 
Since Jesus Christ died for all of these and they will 
all be in desperate need of Him, we have no shred of 
justification for carrying forward to the responsibility 
of a future body of Christians any fraction of this 
task which it is in our power to accomplish in our 
own time. The Church of today must make good the 
delinquencies of the church of yesterday, at least to the 
extent of dealing fairly by its own generation of men 
and women who are yet without Christ. After all, the 
issue is clear. Is our aim to be the complete evangeli- 
zation of the world whenever the Church will see fit 
and will gather up enough daring and energy and faith 
to do it ? Or is it to be the evangelization of our world 
of men in our day, with all that evangelization im- 
plies? We shall leave problems enough to those who 
will come after us ; let us not bequeath this one. 

III. The World Situation in no Previous Generation 
Presented Such a Summons. 

We must bear in mind also the fact that no previ- 
ous generation of Christians has been confronted with 
such a commanding summons to give Christ to the 
world as is facing us in the international situation to- 
day. To bring this fact convincingly before us we 
need only review certain coijsiderations that have 
emerged in our discussion thus far of present world 
conditions. 

L The need of the non-Christian world was never 
so great as it is to-day. It was a bitter enough need 
before ever the War broke out. Often our sympa- 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 141 

thies were kindled as we pictured to ourselves a leper 
in the Philippines, a wife in a Persian harem, a child 
widow in India, a millhand in Tokyo, a semi-slave in 
a Congo labor gang. We tried to multiply the need 
of one life to whom Christ had never come by the total 
number of unevangelized, and our souls were over- 
whelmed. Then came the War. Now to the life of 
the nations without Christ there has come a great new 
access of sorrow, even as there has to us. And with 
the multiplying touch of the worst elements of West- 
ern civilization a whole baneful range of sin and 
misery is now invading the life of the less favored 
nations of the world. 

2. The true expression of Christianity demands im- 
mediate action. In recent years the non-Christian world 
has been made increasingly aware of glaring defects 
in the practices of individuals and nations called 
Christian. But the outbreak and progress of the War 
have brought the ugliness and viciousness of these 
blemishes into a lurid light. We have sent a few mes- 
sengers, a very few, into the great non-Christian popu- 
lations to say, and so far as they could to show, that 
the defects were not a part o:^ Christianity but the 
shadows behind the light, the transgression that 
proved the law. Now, however, the evil to be offset 
and disclaimed is so notorious and so widespread that 
nothing short of a world-wide proclamation and ex- 
hibition of the love of God will be a sufficient dis- 
claimer of what has been un-Christian in our life and 
a vindication of what is truly the spirit of Christ. 

3. The interests of world peace demand immediate 



142 THE CALL OF A WQRLD TASK 

world evangelization. The old order is passing and 
the nations are face to face in a new way. Nothing 
can make the new era one of peace but a general ac- 
ceptance, in the East and West alike, of the prin- 
ciples of Jesus in international relationships. The 
non-Christian nations have now grown in power and 
national self-consciousness to the point where they 
may easily become a menace to the peace of the world. 
Only if Jesus Christ invades their national life and 
sets His mark upon it can that danger be averted. 
But this cannot take place unless He is made known 
throughout those nations. 

4. Other contacts will not wait for later genera- 
tions. Increasingly the life of each nation is being 
thrown against the life of all the other nations. We 
are certain to carry to the non-Christian world our 
most vicious contaminations. We must bring also the 
sweetening, purifying power of the life of Jesus. 
The lessons of sin and social oppression and material- 
ism are easily learned by nations, and the effects of 
these will surely come back upon our own national 
life. It is both unfair and unsafe to develop other 
contacts with the non-Christian world unless we de- 
velop correspondingly our religious contact. If other 
influences will not wait till a future day, we dare not 
hold back our Christianity for a later generation to 
carry into all the world. 

5. The world was never so open as now to the 
Christian message. The prayers which the Church 
used to offer that the doors of the nations would be 
opened to the Gospel have been abundantly answered. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 143 

The greatest obstacles were never difficulties of travel, 
dangers or governmental inhibitions, all of which are 
now being largely overcome. The chief barriers that 
blocked the advance of Christianity were suspicion, 
prejudice, the iron law of custom, long established so- 
cial institutions, the organized and often violent oppo- 
sition of religious bigotry and a passionate loyalty to 
traditional faiths. To-day these difficulties are melt- 
ing away. Conservatism is decreasing, old institu- 
tions are being overturned, the non-Christian religions, 
speaking generally, are steadily losing their control, 
the true errand of the missionary is being understood 
and appreciated. Unless all signs fail, the opportu- 
nities will increase rather than diminish after the 
War. The Mohammedan world, which has presented 
a well-nigh impregnable opposition to the Christian 
approach, bids fair to become much more accessible 
than hitherto it has been. Missionary leaders anticipate 
also that the distribution of returned soldiers among 
the cities and villages of Africa and Asia after the 
War will serve to produce a greater hospitality towards 
the Gospel of Christ in their various countries. Many 
doors stand open to-day. But we cannot expect that 
they will all remain open beyond our generation. 

6. Africa may be won to Christ or to Mohammed 
within this generation. Year by year the tides of 
Mohammedan advance keep moving southward in 
Africa; and they are coming in from the South and 
the East as well. As they come, paganism offers 
almost no resistance. Every Moslem trader is a mis- 
sionary. He presents a religion which makes easy 



144 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

moral and religious demands and which offers worldly 
inducements. The pagan soon recognizes the supe- 
riority of the new religion to his own, readily em- 
braces it and forthwith becomes harder to win to the 
Christian faith than when he was an animist. Dr. 
C. R. Watson states that ten times as many pagans 
are embracing Islam as are being won to the Christian 
faith. Africa will not remain pagan. The issue is 
between Islam and Christianity, and competent ob- 
servers tell us that the issue will be settled within the 
next two or three decades. 

7. The plasticity of many non-Christian nations is 
now at its maximum. The age-long civilizations of 
the East have been overturned. Revolutionary ideas 
have taken hold of political, educational, social and 
economic life. The standards and institutions that 
will control the future of China, Japan, India and 
the Moslem world for generations to come are being 
fashioned to-day. Two-thirds of the world's popu- 
lation during the past ten years have been in the throes 
of this upheaval. As a result of the War the transi- 
tion period is being carried to a more decisive stage 
in those nations, and even remote parts of interior 
Africa and Central Asia are coming under the trans- 
forming spell of Western enlightenment and progress. 
By what flight of the imagination could we conceive 
of a more impressionable condition in the non-Chris- 
tian world? But it will not remain plastic. Already 
before the eyes of this Christian generation the 
moulds are being prepared in which the new era in 
the non-Christian nations will take its permanent 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 145 

form. And, please God, we shall not fail to bring the 
influence of Jesus Christ into the period of prepara- 
tion. A later generation cannot do it. 

8. An unprecedented movement towards Christian- 
ity is in progress in certain mission lands. While 
this movement is not of a general character, it is gath- 
ering in volume and momentum. In parts of Japan, 
Chosen, China and Africa there are vigorous revivals 
and large additions to the membership of the native 
churches — ^beyond all precedent in some sections. In 
India the movement of the submerged masses 
towards Christianity is spreading with bewildering 
rapidity. He gives twice who gives his life quickly 
for the evangelizing of these outcaste millions. Were 
all the rest of the missionary work in the world at a 
standstill, the mass movement in India would signal- 
ize this as an epoch of marvelous missionary oppor- 
tunity. The turning to Christ of thousands of the 
intellectual classes of China is another fact of colossal 
proportions marking this decade as a mountain peak 
in missionary history. Verily the fields are white. If 
this generation of Christians will not reap, the harvest 
will rot upon the ground. 

Need anything further be said to demonstrate that 
the challenge of the present world situation for a 
mighty missionary advance is unique in the history 
of the Christian Church? We dare not act and pray 
as though this situation did not exist. This genera- 
tion has been brought up to a new occasion. It must 
meet it in a new way. How pregnant are these words 
from the message of the Edinburgh Conference in 



146 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

1910, in the light of the mdmentous developments 
within the seven and a half years since they were 
uttered : 

"Just as a great national danger demands a "new 
standard of patriotism and service from every citizen, 
so the present condition of the world and the mission- 
ary task demands from every Christian, and from every 
congregation, a change in the existing scale of mission- 
ary zeal and service, and the elevation of our spiritual 
ideal. 

"The old scale and the old Ideal were framed in view 
of a state of the world which has ceased to exist. They 
are no longer adequate for the new world which is 
arising out of the ruins of the old. . . . The provi- 
dence of God has led us all into a new world of oppor- 
tunity, of danger, and of duty." 

IV. The Present Resources of the Church are Ade- 
quate to a Program of World Evangelization, 

The thoughtful student of world conditions today, 
unless he has quite ruled God out of the guidance of 
human affairs, cannot fail to see the Divine hand in 
the preparation of the nations for the Christian mes- 
sage. If he turns to the Christian Church, which is 
the appointed instrument for the spread of this mes- 
sage, he is met by equally convincing evidence of the 
working of God. The Church is being equipped to 
carry the Gospel into all the earth with a swift prog- 
ress. Never have her resources been so great. 

1. There are new resources in the thought and 
temper of the Church's membership. Christian men 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 147 

and women have been led into serious contemplation 
upon the deeper meanings of their faith and the obli- 
gations it imposes on discipleship. There is a clearer 
appreciation of the value of Christ to human expe- 
rience. Inevitably there goes with this a recognition 
that He alone can meet the needs of humanity every- 
where. Hitherto the lack of this experience and this 
conviction on the part of Christians has been the chief 
factor in staying the expansion of Christ's Kingdom 
in the earth. And it is the facing of the minds and 
hearts of individual Christians towards Christ that 
gives to the Church the first and greatest equipment 
for her world task. It is only those who can answer 
His question "Lovest thou Me?" that are eager or 
quaHfied to feed His sheep. 

But there are other evidences of a growing readi- 
ness in the thought and temper of the Church to un- 
dertake a world enterprise. A new world conscious- 
ness is spreading among Christians, as among others 
today, displacing the former parochialism that found 
the horizon of its responsibility by climbing to its own 
church steeple. This habit of world thought has natu- 
rally been developed rapidly within the years of the 
War.i Christianize the international or "supra-na- 

1 In this new habit of thought the war is bound to prove a 
strong missionary asset. When peace is declared and the Chris- 
tian officers and men, the chaplains, the Red Cross workers, 
the Y. M. C. A. secretaries and others who have been serving 
the forces overseas return, they will be a strong leaven of 
world thinking in their communities and churches. Every 
home that has contributed of its members to the Army or the 
Navy has already a new measure of international interest 



148 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

tional/' thinking of men, and you have put a mission- 
ary purpose into it. There has also been growing 
in Christians during recent years a sense of social ob- 
ligation, a desire to have a share in the Christianizing 
of all human relationships within our communities. 
Internationalize that idea of social Christianity and 
you have the modern missionary aim, in one of its 
most important aspects. This the War should help 
to accomplish. During these years of struggle, years 
of bowed heads and broken hearts and emptied lives, 
there has been a quickening of many sympathies 
which had been dormant. Attach those sympathies 
to the burdens and wrongs and sufferings of the mul- 
titudes in the regions beyond, who have not known 
Christ, and you have a missionary passion. And with 
the capacity for Christian sympathy there has been 
displayed a new capacity for Christian sacrifice. Link 
up that sacrificial habit with the claims of Christ in 
behalf of the wider circle of humanity, and you have 
missionary action. All the moral resources demanded 
of the Church for the work of world redemption — 
idealism, heroism, loyalty, unselfishness — ^have been 
exhibited and put into new exercise within the past 
few years. The mass of Christians are more ready 
today than ever before to be enlisted in a great con- 
quering Crusade for the evangelization of the world. 
2. The Church has rich resources in missionary ex- 
perience. Not only has she the mistakes and successes 
of the past century of missionary effort from which 
to draw lessons of efficiency, but she has behind her 
the powerful momentum of the aggressive missionary 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 149 

activities which have marked the past three decades. 
The Student Volunteer Movement, the Laymen's Mis- 
sionary Movement, the Missionary Education Move- 
ment, the Foreign Missions Conference, and the new 
development and co-ordination of the work of the 
Women's Missionary Societies are evidences of this 
missionary awakening. The emergence of a science 
of missions, the rapid growth in volume and quality 
of missionary literature, the great missionary Councils 
of War at Edinburgh in 1910 and at Panama in 1916 
are further evidences. 

But the past years of missionary activity have done 
more than teach lessons of effective organization and 
administration. They have added greatly to our 
knowledge of non-Christian peoples and the condi- 
tions under which foreign missionary work must be 
carried on. These years of missionary activity have 
also developed a degree of unity and co-operation 
among the various branches of Christianity such as 
has never been called forth by any other undertaking. 
The workers in the mission field have learned that 
without sacrificing their denominational attachments 
and loyalty they can often pool their interests, link 
up their forces and co-ordinate their efforts. Econ- 
omy, efficiency and encouragement have been the re- 
sult. No aspect of missionary work today is more 
noteworthy than this new trend towards mutuai 
confidence and co-operation among the various com- 
munions. 

The resources in missionary experience include also 
the years of seed-sowing on the mission field out of 



150 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

which large harvests are inevitable and are already- 
being reaped; the distribution at points of strategy 
of nearly 25,000 foreign missionaries; the trans- 
lation of the Christian Scriptures in whole or in 
part into 600 languages and dialects ; the work of the 
hospitals, orphanages and other humanitarian insti- 
tutions, of the extensive system of colleges and 
schools of all grades, of the many printing presses and 
of other institutional features of the missionary enter- 
prise; the training of native Christian leaders of abil- 
ity and spiritual power; the Christian churches which 
have been planted broadcast across the non-Christian 
nations, and which are rapidly becoming self-support- 
ing, self -directing and self -propagating ; the develop- 
ment of a native Christian community as a base of 
effort and a witness to the social sufficiency of Chris- 
tianity; the leaven of Christian ideas working power- 
fully in the modern thought of non-Christian so- 
cieties.^ If the Christian Church does not undertake 
at once the full program of world evangelization, it is 
not because she is lacking in a fund of missionary 
experience. 

3. The Church has ample resources in money. 
Think of the money which Christian nations are ex- 
pending in the destructive work of warfare. In re- 
cent months the warring nations have been spending 

* In 1916, according to "World Statistics of Christian Mis- 
sions," there were 24,039 foreign workers in the mission field, 
26,210 organized native churches reported a membership of 
2,408,900, a staff of trained native workers numbering 109,099 
was employed, there were 109 mission colleges and 38,968 
schools with a total registration of 1,930,578, and 2,937 hos- 
pitals and dispensaries had given relief to 8,107,755 persons. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 151 

four times as much money upon their operations in a 
day as they spend on their foreign missionary work 
in a year. The price of one modern battleship would 
finance all the Protestant missionary operations 
throughout the world for five months on the present 
basis. England's war expenses for a day are equal 
to the missionary budget of Protestant Christendom 
for a year. The United States estimated that her 
war expenses for the present fiscal year would amount 
to $50,000,000 a day, or $580 a second. If for one 
day a like sum could be set aside for the work of new 
foreign missionaries, enough men and women could 
be transported to their fields, and maintained during 
their first year, to compass the evangelization of the 
world in this generation. The United States goes to 
the "movies" and spends $500,000,000 a year for the 
privilege. It is estimated that the members of evan- 
gelical churches in this one country possess $15,000,- 
000,000. It is also estimated that if the church mem- 
bers in Canada and the United States would give the 
equivalent of one street car fare a week, the evan- 
gelization of the world could be financed. 

The ability of Canadians to give unselfishly and in 
large amounts has been strikingly demonstrated 
within the last four years. The same has been true 
of the United States, especially during the past year. 
As was pointed out in the previous chapter, this one 
country in 1917 contributed to altruistic purposes con- 
nected with the War more than ten times as much as 
it had given in any previous year for similar purposes. 
The largest unselfish outlays of money ever made in 



152 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

Protestant America have been made in these difficult 
years of the War. Is it too much to expect that 
Christians will be equally unselfish in the use of their 
money in the years that will follow the War? And 
if they seriously desire to have the knowledge of Christ 
go into all the world, will they be restrained because 
the undertaking would cost them each four cents a 
week ? ^ 

4. The Church has adequate resources in men.^ 
Dr. Mott estimated in 1900 that to evangelize the 
world in this generation an addition to the foreign 
missionary forces of 20,000 men and women from 
the colleges of Christendom during a period of thirty 
years would be required. Of this number the colleges 
of the United States and Canada should probably 
furnish sixty per cent, or 12,000 new missionaries.^ 

1 The average foreign missionary contribution from Prot- 
estant church members in the United States and Canada in 
1917 was 80 cents. The average yearly expense of the foreign 
missionary effort carried on by these churches amounts to 
about $2,000 (including salary) for each missionary in service. 
To send out an additional 12,000 workers from these two 
countries would involve on this basis an added annual cost 
of $24,000,000, which amounts to $1.00 per member. 

2 It is estimated that with the help of one foreign missionary 
to every 25,000 of the population the native forces in each 
non-Christian land, who must ultimately be the main evangeliz- 
ing factor, are able to bring the Christian message adequately 
to their own nations. This is, of course, a rough estimate. 

3 According to more recent estimates, such as that made in 
1914 by Mr. W. E. Doughty, 14,000 new missionaries from the 
United States and Canada would be needed to evangelize their 
share of the non-Christian world. See "The Call of the 
World," pp. 83-84. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 153 

Assuming that this number would be required now, 
could they be spared? The colleges and universities 
of Canada have been able to afford many thousands of 
men for military service overseas. Already, so the 
Council of Church Boards of Education estimates, some 
40,000 American students have joined the colors. Ac- 
cording to another estimate, seventy-five per cent of the 
men who were leaders of Christian work in Amer- 
ican colleges in 1916-17 were in uniform by the follow- 
ing Christmas. The number of men students in Canada 
has been cut in half by the War. Two-thirds of the 
university men in Great Britain are in khaki ; in some 
institutions the proportion is even greater. More men 
have been contributed to the War by Oxford and 
Cambridge universities alone than the Student Volun- 
teer Movement judged, when its Watchword was 
adopted, would be required within thirty years for the 
evangelizing of the world. Germany has been able 
to spare 45,000 men from her universities for the 
trenches on her battle fronts. The French univer- 
sities are without any men save those too young for 
military service and those disabled in the War. The 
universities of Belgium are all closed. In these nations 
there has been no withholding of educated manhood 
on the ground that it could not be spared. The na- 
tions that are distributing bases of the Protestant mis- 
sionary enterprise have poured their wealth of man- 
hood into the destructive processes of War, and have 
bravely met the loss by death of many millions of 
their cherished sons. Shall the Churches of Protes- 
tant North America demur if they are asked to spare 



154 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

one church member out of every 2,000,^ and one 
Christian college student out of every twenty ^ for the 
constructive missionary enterprise? Shall any Chris- 
tian whimper and complain that the 1,999 church 
members would not be sufficient to perform the tasks, 
even the greatly increased and absorbing tasks, which 
will be before the Church at home, as well as support 
the one who would go on Christian service overseas, 
or that the nineteen college students who remain would 
be overwhelmed by the responsibilities of leadership 
in the nation because there was a twentieth, a gifted 
man or woman, who went out to help solve the prob- 
lems of a needier nation? The resources of Chris- 
tian nations in money power and man power have 
now been so abundantly demonstrated, that it will be 
stultifying hereafter for anyone to contend that it 
would involve too great a cost to proclaim through all 
the world the greatness of the love of Christ and the 
power of His cross. 

5. The spiritual resources of the Church are un- 
limited. 

In a previous chapter we surveyed some of the dif- 
ficulties in the way of the evangelization of the whole 
world in our generation. If there were nothing to 

* The demand would not really be so great as this figure 
suggests, as the workers sent out would be distributed over a 
generation. 

2 Dr. Mott says : "To furnish the number needed would 
take only one in twenty of the professing Christian students 
of the United States, Canada and Australasia during a period 
of twenty years." — "The Pastof and Modern Missions," pp. 
166-157. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 155 

confront them but the unsupported resources of men, 
they would be formidable enough to make the strong- 
est heart despair. But "our sufficiency is of God." 
Difficulties melt in His presence. In Him are those 
mighty, overcoming energies which accomplish the 
possible and the impossible with equal readiness. 
"There is One with us," says Dr. Speer, "to whom the 
impossible is His chief delight." Any arithmetical 
calculations we make of the numbers of men and the 
amounts of money required can be only very general 
and tentative. The real resources are with Him for 
the evangelizing and the redeeming of the world. But 
He has not been able to do "many mighty works" in 
the non-Christian lands, because of our unbelief as 
a Church. We have not possessed our possessions. 
While the years of the Christian era have gone by, 
God has been waiting to be honored by the faith of a 
generation that would call upon Him for really large 
outpourings of His power. Our* fault has been that 
we have limited God by the trifling dimensions of our 
undertakings, by our failure to appropriate more than 
a meagre supply of the superhuman resources that are 
unlocked to the faith of human agents and by our 
unreadiness to throw ourselves into the ministry of 
intercession in the world's behalf. 

God has honored this generation as He has never 
honored a generation before. He has thrown daz- 
zling opportunities before it. He has flung wide open 
for it the doors of access to all parts of His world 
and has laid at its feet every possible advantage and 
facility. Through the significant happenings of the 



156 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

recent years, through the break-up of the old civiliza- 
tions, and even through the shock and noise of the 
world's armed strife, His voice comes to us, "Remem- 
ber ye not the former things, neither consider the 
things of old. Behold I will do a new thing." ^ "Go 
ye, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations. . . . 
I am with you." ^ In His unerring wisdom He has 
chosen our generation of Christians to face the re- 
sponsibility of this decisive hour in the development 
of His program for the world. Was ever a Christian 
generation trustee of an opportunity so great? The 
mystery of this confidence we can never understand. 
But we can and must act on it. We must prbve 
worthy of it. And for this we must possess in fact 
what is ours by promise. We must supply the condi- 
tions whereby there may be communicated to us those 
living energies that are our only confidence for so 
overwhelming a task. If the Christian Church of this 
generation would by faith lay claim to those dynamic 
forces and by obedience open her life foi^ their com- 
ing, nothing could resist the triumphant sweep of her 
campaign of love among the needy nations of the 
world. 

V. This is the Generation for which We me Re- 
sponsible. 

Apart from all the foregoing reasons for the evan- 
gelizing of the entire world in this generation, there 
is the very simple fact that this is our generation. 

1 Isaiah 43 : 18. 

2 Matthew 28: 19, 20. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 157 

If we have any responsibility to give the Gospel to 
others, it must be a responsibility for those who are 
now living. It is a responsibility therefore which we 
cannot alienate. We cannot reach generations that 
are gone and only indirectly can we reach the genera- 
tions yet to come. But we of this generation have 
the Gospel, while others of this generation are with- 
out it. Our responsibility leads directly to them and 
later generations cannot share it with us. 

Obvious though this accountability appears, the 
Church has been slow to recognize it. A century and 
a quarter ago there were few Christians who were 
prepared to accept a responsibility for any part of 
the unevangelized world. When William Carey pro- 
posed to a meeting of Baptist ministers in England 
a discussion of the question, "The duty of Christians 
to attempt the spread of the Gospel among heathen 
nations," he was called "a miserable enthusiast." In 
the Scottish General Assembly in 1796 a petition to* 
send the Gospel to the heathen was met by a motion 
that "to spread abroad a knowledge of the Gospel 
among barbarous and heathen nations seems to be 
highly preposterous, in so far as philosophy and learn- 
ing must, in the nature of things, take the prece- 
dence; and that while there remains at home a single 
individual without the means of religious knowledge, 
to propagate it abroad would be improper and ab- 
surd." It was in the face of such opposition that the 
modern missionary movement began in Gr'eat Britain. 

In North America there were at that time few 
Christians who recognized their responsibility for giv- 



158 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

ing the Gospel to those who were then living without 
it. When in 1806 that little group of students at 
Williams College prayed in the shelter of a haystack 
and rjose convinced that the obligation to give Christ 
to the non-Christians of their generation rested upon 
them and their fellow-Christians who were then liv- 
ing, they were under no delusion that this conviction 
would meet with a general response in the Church of 
their day. Yet that prayer meeting led to the forma- 
tion of the American Board. Other Foreign Mis- 
sion Societies were organized and gradually the North 
American churches began to make missionary history. 
In 1886, a larger group of students, representing 
many colleges of the United States and Canada, were 
gathered at Mt. Hermon, Mass. There they faced 
the needs of those who in their generation were still 
without the Gospel. The claims of Christ upon them 
in behalf of the non-Christian world came vividly to 
that company as a binding obligation and then and 
there one hundred of them offered their lives for for- 
eign service. This was the beginning of the Student 
Volunteer Movement. The missionary fires kindled 
there spread through the colleges and into the churches 
and a new missionary awakening was begun. In 1888 
the formal organization of the Movement was effected, 
and the Watchword was adopted, "The Evangeliza- 
tion of the World in this Generation." It was 
a startling idea to most Christians, and it was 
decried and even derided by some Christian lead- 
ers as ill-considered and visionary, the catchy slogan 
of a few irresponsible, if well-meaning, enthusiasts. 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 159 

That was thirty years ago. During the interval the 
missionary purpose has entered the lives of a rapidly 
increasing number of Christians, the Watchword^ has 
been soundly interpreted and better understood, and 
today Christian leaders are seldom heard to attack or 
even question it. Moreover, it has been accepted as 
a challenge, an inspiration and a guiding principle 
of life by many thousands of Christians in Anglo- 
Saxon America, in Protestant Europe, in South 
Africa, in Australia and a large number of mission 
lands. 

Again in January, 1918, a company of students as- 
sembled in the Connecticut Valley at Northfield, 
Mass., to attend the Student Volunteer Conference. 
They v^ere gathered from all sections of the United 
States and from Canada to consider together the im- 
mediate world situation facing the Christian stu- 
dents of North America and to estimate their present 
missionary responsibility. Immediately across the 
river was Mt. Hermon, where just a generation be- 
fore the Movement had its birth, and the spell of that 
earlier gathering was upon the Conference. Some 



*The evangelization of the world, i.e., such a presentation 
of the Gospel to all mankind as will make possible its in- 
telligent acceptance, does not mean the Christianization of 
the world. True, the modern interpretation of the missionary- 
errand of Christianity covers its social as well as individual 
application. But the evangelizing of the world is essential to 
its Christianization. The Gospel must be known before it can 
function. For a reasoned interpretation of the watchword 
the reader is referred to Dr. Mott's "The Evangelization of 
the World in this Generation." 



160 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

of the original one hundred volunteers were present. 
And as the delegates looked steadily and obediently 
at the conditions of the hour throughout the world, 
the Watchwotd seemed to take on a new significance 
and intensity and urgency. It is safe to say that they 
went back to their institutions with a deep, determined 
conviction that a demand, unusual and imperative, is 
upon the present Christian generation to convey to the 
non-Christian nations the message and spirit of Jesus 
Christ, so that He may transform their individual and 
national life and govern their international attitudes. 

How immensely worthy this ideal is, how satisfying 
and exhilarating! It looks ahead to the day of a re- 
deemed humanity, the day when not only the message 
of Christ will be given out everywhere, but when His 
spirit will prevail in all social relationships and direct 
every national gesture and attitude towards other na- 
tions. The Watchword explicitly calls for the former, 
but it assuredly implies the latter. 

A life organized around this governing aim is a 
poised, powerful, well-directed life. It is a life whose 
faith is fixed in the certainties of love's invincibility 
and the coming of Christ's Kingdom. It is a life centred 
in God's will for the world. It is a life that will count 
for something great in the service of humanity. It is a 
life for which there now abideth faith, hope, love, 
these three. If the number of such lives were mul- 
tiplied, especially among college men and women, 
there would be no question of having enough 
thoroughly qualified volunteers to go forth with 
the message of life so that it could be intelli- 



A WORLD PROGRAM IN THE CHURCH 161 

gently and intelligibly brought to all of our generation 
who are still without it, nor would there be any ques- 
tion of there being behind these missionaries a loyal, 
backing in material support and prevailing prayer. 

At the close of his book "The Decisive Hour of 
Christian Missions," Dr. Mott utters these searching 
words: "It is indeed the decisive hour of Christian 
missions. It is the time of all times for Christians 
of every name to unite and with quickened loyalty 
and with reliance upon the living God, to undertake 
to make Christ known to all men, and to bring His 
power to bear upon all nations. It is high time to face 
this duty and with serious purpose to discharge it. 
Let leaders and members of the Church reflect on the 
awful seriousness of the fact that times and opportu- 
nities pass. The Church must use them or lose them. 
The sense of immediacy and the spirit of reality are 
the need of the hour. Doors open and doors shut 
again. Time presses. The living, the living he shall 
praise Thee.' Let each Christian so resolve and so 
act that if a sufficient number of others will do like- 
wise, all men before this generation passes away may 
have an adequate opportunity to know of Christ." 

This is the only generation we can reach. But we 
can reach it, and all of it, with the spirit and message 
of Christ. To most of those who live contempora- 
neously with us He is a stranger now. Most desper- 
ately they need Him, Though they do not know it, 
they long for Him for their freedom and enlighten- 
ment and salvation. They are waiting, as the genera- 
tions before them have waited. Shall those who come 



162 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

after them wait tcK>, because we of this privileged 
generation of Christians have failed to go to them 
jthrough wide open doors with gifts of healing and 
light and life? 

At Khartoum in Africa there is a statue of General 
Gordon facing not towards home but towards the 
desert and the great Sudan. Some lines written by 
a visitor on seeing this statue speak not only for the 
Sudan, largely unoccupied by Christian missionaries, 
but for* the thousand million of our generation to 
whom the living Christ has not come. 

"The string of camels come in single file, 

Bearing their burdens o'er the desert sand; 

Swiftly the boats go plying on the Nile, 
The needs of men are met on every hand. 

But still I wait 

For the messenger of God who cometh late. 

"I see the cloud of dust rise in the plain, 

The measured tread of troops falls on the ear; 

The soldier comes the Empire to maintain, 
Bringing the pomp of war, the reign of fear. 

But still I wait; 

The messenger of Peace, he cometh late. 

"They set me looking o'er the desert drear, 

Where broodeth darkness as the deepest night. 
From many a mosque there comes the call to prayer; 

I hear no voice that calls on Christ for light. 
But still I wait 
For the messenger of Christ who cometh late." 



CHAPTER VI 

THE CALL FOR A FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN 
FORCES 

Half measures will not avail for any great task. 
The undertaking which we have been considering will 
be accomplished by nothing less than the enlistment 
of the full strength of the Church. 

For the churches of Canada and the United States 
this means more than at first appears. In the years 
before the War the churches of the English-speaking 
world carried on four-fifths of the total missionary 
operations of Protestant Christendom. In all proba- 
bility Anglo-Saxon Christianity will now have to in- 
crease its share. And as Great Britain will come out 
of the War more greatly weakened both in men and 
in money resources than the belligerent nations of 
North America, the churches of these two nations 
must now prepare to carry a larger proportion than 
ever of the entire missionary program. 

I. The War has Revealed the Possibilities of Thor- 
ough Mobilization, 
History has not furnished a revelation of really 
scientific and thorough mobilization of a nation's re- 

163 



164 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

sources to be compared with what some of the bel- 
ligerent nations have accomplished during the present 
War. Germany, with characteristic thoroughness, 
a centralized and almost all-powerful government and 
long years of quiet preparation, stands easily first in 
completeness of mobilization. But some of the other 
nations engaged have not been far behind. Great 
Britain and France have marshalled their resources 
in a way that only unity of purpose, passionate 
conviction and organizing genius could accomplish. 
Canada, in common with the other British dominions, 
penetrating in a flash to the real issues of the struggle, 
did not wait till her aid was asked but leaped to the 
side of the mother country, put all petty undertakings 
in abeyance, called a truce in her family quarrels and 
threw herself with energy into the conflict. With the 
exception of one province she compacted herself to- 
gether in an all-embracing plan of organization for the 
matter in hand. 

The proverbial American genius for organization 
has found in the War an occasion large enough and 
great enough to call forth its powers in an unparalleled 
degree. With her passion for democracy fanned into 
flame, the United States has been willing to take 
measures seemingly inconsistent and undemocratic 
and subject herself to more paternalism in government 
than she had ever known before. She found, as other 
nations found, that all the elements in her national life 
must be laid imder tribute to the common end. She 
said, "This one thing I do." She set out to mobilize 
her industry, her capital, her transportation, her food. 



FULL MOBIUZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 165 

her fuel, her science, her manpower and in this way- 
she is gathering up her maximum strength. 

In the process of mobilization the United States is 
learning, as Canada and other belligerents have 
learned, that the full weight of a nation's impact can- 
not be supplied until the common purpose takes a deep 
hold on individual life. This is more than a matter of 
a disciplined acceptance of the inevitable, a reduction 
of luxuries, a popular economy in fuel and food, or 
a generous subscription to Victory Loans and Liberty 
Loans. It is a matter of mobilizing the moral and 
religious resources of the nation, the thrice arming 
of those whose deepest convictions tell them that they 
have their quarrel just. It is only then that "doing 
one's bit" becomes a worthy contribution to the com- 
mon fund of the nation's strength. Sir Thomas 
White, Canada's Minister" of Finance, speaking in 
June, 1917, on the MiHtary Service Bill, said: 

No democracy ever puts forth its greatest effort until the 
religious sentiment of democracy is enlisted. Take the War 
of the Secession in the United States. Read the second in- 
augural of Abraham Lincoln. Read Julia Ward Howe's 
"Battle Hymn of the Republic." 

"Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord; 
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath 
are stored." 

The literature and poetry of that period breathe with re- 
ligious fervor. You never get the strength of democracy 
until, in addition to its material effort, there is put forth 
its spiritual effort. There must be self-sacrifice. There must 
be self-denial. There- must be the mobilization of the spir- 
itual energies of the nation. 



166 ' THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

II. The Church is Capable of Similar Mobilisation 
for Her World Campaign, 
Few probably have realized to what extent this thor- 
ough-going mobilization might be duplicated by the 
Church for her world campaign. Obviously, we are 
not now on a war footing as a body of Christians. 
We have maintained an ordained Protestant minister 
at home for every 507 of the population, and have 
sent abroad a sufficient number of workers, clerical 
and lay, including the wives of missionaries, to sup- 
ply one to every fifty or sixty thousand of the non- 
Christian peoples.^ We are cared for by doctors to 
the extent of one for every 647 of our population, and 
as Protestant Christians have furnished non-Christian 
lands with one for about every million.^ Not much 
evidence in all this of a flaming Crusader spirit in the 
Church, even though we sing lustily, "Like a mighty 
army, moves the Church of God" ! While the foreign 
missionary contributions of our churches amount to 
only $L22 per member, and a large proportion of the 
membership are not reported as giving anything at all, 
the Church hardly seems to be ablaze with a mission- 
ary passion. It is not surprising to hear a missionary 
as he comes back from Turkey and looks squarely at 
a few facts like these declare that the Church must 



* Even considering the fact that ultimately the greater part 
of the Christian work in the mission field must be done 
through native agents, this disproportion presents an indict- 
ment and a challenge. 

2 Exclusive of Japan, the only mission land which has de- 
veloped a strong medical profession. 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 167 

get on a war basis or give up her battle hymns.^ Mis- 
sionaries face to face with immense difficulties tell 
us with one voice that the real difficulty is not at the 
front but at the home base.^ In the words of a catchy 
phrase of the day, "what happens 'over there* depends 
on what happens over here." 

The Church should emulate the nation in the mobili- 
zation of her resources. Not only can she parallel the 
process, but there is much in it which she can capture 
for her world campaign. We have said that the nation 
is mobilizing moral and spiritual resources. But a 
quality is not one thing in the nation and another thing 
in the Church. "Loyalty," says L. P. Jacks in the Janu- 
ary, 1918, Atlantic Monthly, "has no definite pro- 
gramme/ and yet it is the mother of all the pro- 
grammes that lead to good results. . . . Loyalty is 
growing, and nothing could give us a fairer promise 
of a general resurrection in the better tendencies of 
human life." ^ All the fine quahties that have recently 
been awakened in the lives of men and women are 
awake for any high and ennobling cause that will 
command them. They are awake for the enterprise of 



1 See pamphlet, "The Church on a War Basis," by S. Ralph 
Harlow. 

2 A Canadian soldier in Kitchener's army wrote from a hos- 
pital a month before he died: "Why does our Church keep 
Foreign Missions so much in the background? Why is it 
that I was left so long a scoffer? I do not blame any mortal. 
I am saying that something is wrong with the scheme of 
things which fails to put the whole world for Christ right in 
the forefront as the battlecry of the Christian Church." 

3 Pp. 212, 213. 



168 THE CALL OB A WORLD TASK 

spreading Christ's Kingdom throughout the earth. 
There is every reason why a wave of patriotism in 
that Kingdom should now sweep across the Church 
of Christ at least as holy and compelling as the patriot- 
ism that is capturing our national life in the mass. 
*There is a contagion of courage as well as of disease. 
Faith catches fire from faith, as well as fear from fear. 
The average man finds himself unable to resist the 
torrent of valor and self-denial and self-sacrifice." ^ 

Let us consider now how national mobilization may 
be duplicated in the Church. 

1. IntelHgence should be mobilized. The nations 
are giving great attention to this factor. They are 
spreading information through the entire school sys- 
tems. They have levied tribute on the pulpits for the 
same purpose. They are utilizing the press from the 
largest city daily to the smallest rural weekly. They 
have secured the co-operation of the myriad motion 
picture houses which display patriotic bulletins, car- 
toons and official war pictures several times a day. 
The American Government has enlisted an army of 
20,000 effective speakers, "Four-Minute Men," as they 
are called, who spread information and enthusiasm in 
theatres and elsewhere throughout the land. The gov- 
ernments maintain mammoth pubhcity bureaus to issue 
a multitude of pamphlets, and in general to direct the 
campaign of promoting intelligence in the public mind. 

How meagre in comparison are the Church's efforts 
to inform her membership regarding the world en- 
terprise of missions. The foundation of the whole un- 

1 R, T. Stevenson, "Missions Versus Militarism," p. 411 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 169 

dertaking is intelligence. Activity, generosity, prayer, 
all wait upon knowledge, and yet the overwhelming 
majority of church members are pitifully ignorant on 
this large, practical, highly interesting question. It is 
true that many of these Christians are provincial, and 
do not care to know about the wider activities of the 
Church. But it is also true that the efforts to give 
information are inadequate. While many strong mis- 
sionary magazines and pamphlets are being written 
each year, the output of missionary material should 
be improved in variety, quality and appearance, and, 
more important still, the use of this material should 
be promoted with greater vigor. In local congrega- 
tions the giving of missionary information should not 
be limited to a Missionary Sunday or a monthly mis- 
sionary sermon. It should be a recurring element in 
the pastor's sermons and prayer meeting addresses, 
and should be conveyed through the Sunday school, 
the Young People's Society and the other organiza- 
tions of the Church. A program of Mission Study 
classes, covering all ages, should be promoted in every 
congregation and supplemented by a campaign of in- 
dividual missionary reading, a bulletin board, illus- 
trated lectures and other methods. 

In colleges and universities similar methods should 
be employed.^ Especially should groups be formed, 



1 See pamphlets "The Organization of Mission Study 
Among Students," "Missionary Meetings," "Missionary Pro- 
grams for Schoolboys," "The Missionary Life of the Theo- 
logical Seminary," and other publications of the Student Vol- 
unteer Movement. 



170 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

by whatever name they may be called, for missionary 
study and discussion. They should be under capable 
leaders and should be sufficient in number to cover the 
whole student body. The aim should be to have every 
Christian student leave college an intelligent, enthu- 
siastic exponent of the missionary enterprise. To ac- 
complish this no method is so successful as the Mis- 
sion Study group, though many other methods, such 
as curriculum instruction in missions are highly serv- 
iceable. While this purpose should prevail in all in- 
stitutions of higher learning, it is particularly neces- 
sary in the theological seminaries. A congregation can 
hardly rise to a high degree of missionary intelligence 
if it has not a missionary pastor; and, in the main, 
missionary pastors are produced in the theological 
seminaries, which are the Officers' Training Camps 
of the missionary campaign. How important it is that 
every seminary graduate should come to his first con- 
gregation equipped with a richly furnished missionary 
mind, eager to inform and arouse his people for the 
spread of the Kingdom. 

2. Leadership should be mobilized. The nations 
have been alert to do this. They have called upon 
men of influence and outstanding ability for service 
in various directions. Reference has been made al- 
ready to the enlisting of teachers, ministers and 
"Four-Minute Men." Men have been taken from the 
most important regular occupations and pressed into 
some emergency service. Pastors have been called 
from their congregations for publicity work. Secre- 
taries of missionary organizations have been drafted 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 171 

for important duties in Quartermasters' offices and 
elsewhere. Railroad presidents, heads of industrial 
concerns and college professors have been asked to 
drop their usual work to fill temporary positions under 
the Government. Foreign missionaries unable to re- 
turn to their fields have done duty along food conser- 
vation and other lines. The United States asked the 
head of its Belgian Relief Commission to become its 
Food Commissioner, and the head of a college to be- 
come Fuel Commissioner. The president of the great 
National City Bank was taken to Washington to serve 
the Government at $1.00 a year and many other men 
of prominence and ability are there giving their time 
and talents on the same salary. Leading artists have 
been called to perfect the art of camouflage on sea 
and land. Scientists and inventors have been set apart 
in laboratories to give their best to the nation. Club 
women, social leaders, women of national and local 
prominence have assumed important duties, that de- 
mand all of their time, at the call of the Government, 
the Red Cross and the Young Women's Christian As- 
sociation. Financiers, ministers and captains of in- 
dustry have turned aside from their pressing occupa- 
tions to serve the War Work Council of the Young 
Men's Christian Association. Leadership in every 
department of the nation's life has been mobilized on a 
colossal scale. 

Can the Church not mobilize her leadership in a 
similar way for her world campaign? Where are the 
necessary forces of leadership to be found? First, of 
course, in the Foreign Mission Board rooms. In these 



172 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

offices there is a secretarial staff of men and women 
that in devotion, energy, executive ability, administra- 
tive gifts and the power to inspire confidence and com- 
mand a following, might well be the envy of great 
corporations. The Church is rich in its missionary 
secretaryship. But for the larger missionary pro- 
grams that will now be projected in most of the church 
communions, there will have to be an enlargement of 
the existing staff. For the new positions that may be 
created, even the minor positions, none but men, both 
ministers and laymen, and women of high quaHties 
of leadership should be chosen. For an undertaking 
of such dimensions and such importance, each church 
must be bold to demand and expect the best fitted men 
and women in its entire communion, regardless of any 
minor claims that may be upon them. And in the spe- 
cial missionary campaigns that from time to time are 
launched in the various denominations, why should 
not the best talent in the Church, such as college presi- 
dents and heads of large commercial and industrial 
concerns, who have a missionary passion, be drafted 
by the missionary societies for emergency service? 
In these coming years the problems of expansion, of 
reconsideration and rearrangement in the missionary 
work of the churches will make exacting demands on 
the leaders of this work such as only the ablest among 
consecrated Christian minds will be able to meet.^ 

In the local congregation the pastor is the logical 
leader. As has been pointed out, he is "the key to the 

1 See article "The Training of the Missionary," by J. S. 
Brough, in The East and the West, January, 1918. 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 173 

missionary problem." In the main, the forward move- 
ment of the Christian Church for carrying Christian- 
ity into all parts of the world will stand or fall with 
its ministry. Now is the time for every minister to 
grasp this fact and gird himself for the greatest un- 
dertaking to which he has ever put his hand. Now, 
too, is the time for him to commandeer the services 
of the men and women in his congregation who pos- 
sess energy, vision, ability and influence, and who with 
him might constitute such an inner circle of leadership 
in missionary intelligence and liberaHty and interces- 
sion as would make of that church a productive muni- 
tions plant. Speaking before a laymen's gathering in 
Nova Scotia, the Honorable N. W. Rowell, K. C, 
President of the Privy Council of Canada, declared 
that the churches should "change their whole attitude 
and recognize that this work is the supreme business 
of the Church." "It is not only nation building," he 
said, "it is empire building for our Lord and Saviour 
Jesus Christ. It is a mighty problem, world-wide in 
its sweep, and calls for the highest display of genuine 
devotion and self-sacrifice by the brainiest and wisest 
men of the world. It is into this noblest of all ser- 
vices and most wonderful of all works that we as 
laymen are called." ^ 

The same is true of every college, university and 
theological seminary. The Christian organizations in 
these institutions must recognize this "noblest of all 
services" as their highest objective and plan their work 

1 See pamphlet, "Will Canada Evangelize Her Share of 
the World?" by Newton W. Rowell, p. 24. 



174 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

accordingly. Often it has been true that the mission- 
ary leadership of an institution has been vested in men 
or women of second quality, who were indolent or 
inefficient, who were unable to perceive the dignity 
and high claims of their task, or who did not command 
the confidence and co-operation of their fellow-stu- 
dents. Where this has been the case, the missionary 
plans of that administration either were wo fully in- 
adequate or were not carried through successfully. A 
task so comprehensive in its claims upon every Chris- 
tian student on the campus should be under the direc- 
tion of the ablest and most influential students. 

The strategy of this course in the college world lies 
in the part that the colleges and seminaries may play 
in furnishing missionary leadership for the churches. 
There are thousands of men and women throughout 
the churches today who, if they are enlisted at all, are 
merely privates in the missionary ranks, but who, had 
they been reached in college by an aggressive and 
competently led missionary program, would now be 
holding rank as recruiting sergeants and captains and 
generals. Under God, there may be such a missionary 
uprising among the students of this college generation 
as will go far to supply the demand for missionary 
leadership in the churches in the coming three decades. 
Towards that result the plans of Christian students 
today should be directed. 

3. Material resources should be mobilized. The na- 
tions have been doing it. When Canada decided to 
enter the War she staked her material fortune on it. 
The United States did the same. Their Governments 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 175 

went to the public for the necessary military and naval 
expenditures — first, in the form of taxes, and second, 
in the form of loans that have already amounted to 
many billions of dollars. The assumption was that 
the War is the undertaking of every man, woman and 
child in the nation, that all are profoundly interested 
in it and are ready to show their interest by paying 
the costs involved. There were nine and a half mil- 
lion subscribers to the second Liberty Loan in the 
United States in October, 1917, and half a million 
subscribers to the Victory Loan in Canada in Novem- 
ber, 1917. The Governments assume, too, that spon- 
taneously the financial strength of their citizens will 
be thrown into Patriotic Funds, Red Cross and other 
benevolences connected with the War. National 
finances are for the time on a war basis. 

The Church of Jesus Christ must mobihze her 
financial power if her world campaign is to be waged 
successfully. Large enough demands have never yet 
been made upon the money resources of Christians. 
Christians are ready today to be heroic in their giv- 
ing. An indication of this is found in the dimensions 
of Canada's recurring campaigns for war benevolences, 
such as the Red Cross and Patriotic Fund campaign 
in January, 1918. Toronto, which, in common with 
other Canadian cities, seems unable to drain its lib- 
erality dry, was asked for three million dollars in this 
last campaign and gave an extra $300,000 for good 
measure. Canada has now contributed over twenty 
million dollars to the Red Cross and her Patriotic 
Fund has reached thirty million dollars. The Young 



176 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

Men's Christian Association went to the public of the 
United States in November, 1917, for thirty-five mil- 
lion dollars, and the response was over fifty million. 
Dr. Mott said that this sum "greatly exceeds the 
united annual budgets of the Home and Foreign Mis- 
sions Boards of all the churches of America. It con- 
stitutes the largest single offering to a Christian cause 
ever made at a given time in the history of Christian- 
ity." The fact is, the Christians of our two nations 
must wonder why some real financial challenges are 
not thrown down to them for the expansion of the 
Kingdom to which they belong. As has been said 
above, one great Church is now to ask of its members 
each year for their world program four times as much 
as they have contributed on the basis of the old pro- 
gram. Why should not all the churches make similar 
large demands for their foreign work, not, of course, 
reducing the demands for local and national work, 
but scaling them up correspondingly? 

This is more than a material demand. It \s the 
tangible form of a spiritual demand to which men and 
women are today ready to respond. The rank and file 
of the public is more ready for great challenges to 
unselfish action than they have been in many decades. 
If this is true, the Church will be found unfaithful if 
she fails to call her members to a new and great ad- 
venture in world redemption and to ask boldly for 
such gifts of money as will show concretely that men 
are setting Christ's Kingdom above selfish interest. 

In the faith that a readiness to do something large- 
hearted, beyond all previous times, existed among 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 177 

students, there was set before American college men 
and women ^ last fall an undertaking to raise a mil- 
lion dollars for the relief of prisoners of war and 
for kindred objects. Nothing on that scale had ever 
been attempted before. The students and faculty 
members responded with pledges for $1,500,000. It 
was an outburst of idealism and unselfishness beyond 
all precedent. At the Northfield Conference, the 
financial part of the forward program agreed upon 
involved the contributing by American and Canadian 
students and professors during 1918-19 of $500,000 
for foreign missions,^ in addition to amounts to be 
raised for war relief funds. This is a goal that can 
be reached only by genuine unselfishness. For some 
it will undoubtedly mean heroic sacrifice. But that 
spirit is in the colleges, ready to be called upon for 
noble purposes. The Students' Friendship War Fund 
demonstrated it. It would have been poor psychology 
and poor spiritual strategy not to summon that spirit 
to an equally high endeavor in the next college year. 
The new program will allow Christian students to 
show in terms of the tangible that they wish to put 
themselves at Christ's disposal in a sacrificial way for 
the enlargement of His Kingdom in the world. 



1 The plan did not include Canadian students, who were 
already giving generously to similar funds. 

2 The largest sum raised for missions in previous years 
was $247,424, in 1916-17, and included gifts to college mis- 
sionary funds from alumni and other friends. The present 
program represents only personal gifts from students and 
professors. 



178 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

If the money resources of Christians are to be mo- 
bilized in any adequate way for the foreign mission- 
ary work of the Church, four things are necessary. 
(1) The needs of the Kingdom of God beyond our 
shores must share more largely in the total benefac- 
tions of most Christians. The needs at our own doors 
demand not less than has been contributed, but vastly 
more. At the same time, it is to be remembered that 
the greater needs for which we are responsible are 
not at home, but abroad. Many churches are coming 
to feel that they are not justified in spending more 
on their local requirements than on the needs outside 
their congregational bounds. It would be a reason- 
able and wholesome standard for most churches to 
adopt. In a number of colleges the local budget 
of the Christian Association is smaller by far than 
the missionary offerings of the students. This should 
be the case in every institution. Many colleges and 
many congregations now provide the support of a 
missionary ; but their number might be multiplied sev- 
eral times. 

(2) The number of givers should be greatly in- 
creased. In a church it should include at least all 
who are on the roll of membership and in a college 
at least all of the Christian students on the cam- 
pus. Many of the patriotic appeals of the hour are 
based on the proposition that since some are giving 
their lives the least that all of the others can do is 
to give their money. As a poster in the recent Cana- 
dian Red Cross campaign put it crisply, "Some fight, 
some pay." It is the highwayman's demand of 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 179 

*'money or your life." It should be rigorously main- 
tained that since some Christian men and women are 
leaving all and putting their lives into the campaign 
of winning the world for Christ, all other Christians, 
to whom equally the cause belongs, should pay in 
terms of money. 

(3) The giving should be systematic. Experience 
is abundant to show that systematic missionary con- 
tributions produce a much larger fund and bring in 
an evener flow the spiritual reactions that come to the 
giver, than in the case of spasmodic gifts. 

(4) The giving should be based on a sense of stew- 
ardship. We come here to the springs of action. 
Nothing is so likely to bring a generous and sustained 
financial response from men and women as a sense of 
trusteeship under God. And no giving will bring 
back into one's life such abundant blessing as the giving 
that comes up out of a recognition of God's absolute 
ownership of one's self and substance as a part of 
His estate. Giving of this sort is motived on the will 
of God. It is a normal and inevitable fruitage of 
Christian discipleship, and, taken together with the 
other fruits of the consecrated life, it supplies a basis 
for the growth of the Kingdom. 

4. Man power must be mobilized. This our nations 
have been doing. For her army and navy the United 
States took the shortcut of conscription. Canada, 
having tried voluntary enlistment, came to conscrip- 
tion in the end. Both nations also have been mobiliz- 
ing their man power for service at the home base. 
They have been trying to direct currents of men and 



180 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

women to the points of greatest need, such as ship- 
yards, munitions factories, mines and farms. The 
theory on which they base these efforts is that the War 
is the affair of every man and woman. 

So the Church must act on the assumption that her 
world campaign is the affair of every Christian, and 
endeavor to bring to every individual in her member- 
ship a sense of personal responsibihty. First of all, 
there must be enlisted for overseas service enough 
well-qualified men and women to carry the message 
of Christ to every part of the non-Christian world. 
With but rare 'exceptions these workers must come 
from the colleges and theological seminaries. The 
time is ripe to enlist them in unparalleled numbers. 
The same idealism that is ready to offer money is 
ready to offer life. The same spirit that has half 
emptied the Canadian colleges of their men^ should 
avail to bring volunteers on both sides of our common 
border-line for the foreign service of the Church. 
Surely there will be no holding back^ We think of 
the tens of thousands of American and Canadian stu- 
dents who have thrilled at the opportunity to give 
their lives to the nation's cause, and of the tens of 
thousands besides whose souls are restless within them 



1 It is reported that the attendance at the universities, col- 
leges and theological seminaries of Canada is about fifty per 
cent of the normal registration. In some institutions it is 
only thirty per cent. It is significant that in some univer- 
sities, when the new Conscription Act came into force, not 
one student was taken, as all who would come under that 
Act had already enlisted. 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 181 

because they cannot go. The spirit is in the colleges, 
the spirit of volunteering, the spirit that leaps to the 
place of need and difficulty and opportunity. If it 
follows the flag, will it not follow the Cross? Surely 
there will now be volunteers enough for the King's 
overseas contingent. 

The Foreign Mission Boards of the United States 
and Canada are now calling for workers to fill up- 
wards of a thousand positions in various mission 
fields. As the policies of these Boards develop in 
the next few years, yet larger numbers of qualified 
missionary candidates will be called for. It will be 
vain for any students to wait till these calls come be- 
fore they volunteer for foreign service. No time is 
to be lost, if prospective missionaries are to secure 
the necessary equipment for their life work. They 
should volunteer now if they would be prepared when 
the larger demands are made by the Mission Boards. 

Moreover, the offering of life for this service 
should not be dependent on the definite demands 
which the Church makes on the colleges and semin- 
aries for missionary candidates. The real call is to be 
found in the non-Christian world's need for Christ 
and Christ's need for men and women to take Him 
to the non-Christian world. Let those to whom this 
call makes special appeal heed it now and enhst. 
What would more effectively challenge the Church 
to an immense expansion of her foreign missionary 
work than that a large body of earnest, capable stu- 
dents should dedicate their lives to service in the for- 
eign field and should formally offer themselves to the 



182 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

Mission Boards for this holy errand? The fires kin- 
dled in these lives would spread rapidly and the 
Church would be inspired to a new standard of mis- 
sionary endeavor. If that group of students at Will- 
iams College in 1806, or that other company of stu- 
dents at Mt. Hermon eighty years later had waited 
before offering their lives until the churches should 
call upon the colleges for a missionary uprising, the 
cause of Christ in the non-Christian world would have 
been seriously delayed. Who knows but in the provi- 
dence of God the great missionary awakening that 
should now sweep through the churches is to be stim- 
ulated by a large offering of life by college men and 
women ? 

Surely, too, there will be no holding back by par- 
ents. Down into distant pages of history there will 
go the story of how fathers and mothers in these 
stern days took their hands off the sons who wanted 
to go out and fight and endure hardship and come 
back or not come back. Mr. Choate tells of a friend 
of his, who wrote him about her four sons, three of 
whom had gone into the army and one into the navy. 
Of the three one was dead, one wounded, one a pris- 
oner. But in her letter this brave English woman 
spoke of being "proud that we have been able to de- 
vote all of our sons to the cause." That spirit is 
duplicated in hundreds of thousands of parents to- 
day. Surely they or other parents will not object, but 
will count it all joy when their sons and daughters tell 
them that they have heard the call of the King for 
workers among the darkened and oppressed and suffer- 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 183 

ing peoples of the earth, and that they have answered 
the call with the offer of their lives. 

But to mobilize the man power of the Church means 
far more than the enlistment of a large missionary 
force such as we would not have dreamed of five years 
ago. It involves the enlistment of a supporting con- 
stituency that will be fully adequate to an advance 
missionary program. And a supporting constituency 
will be inadequate that does not include the full mem- 
bership of organized Christianity. The nation calls 
upon its last citizen to make his definite contribution 
to the winning of the War. The demand of the 
Church for its world campaign should be equally em- 
bracing. Over in China the Christians have been alert 
to do this very thing. 

As the Great War has inspired and emphasized the appeal 
of national leaders for the utmost possible self-sacrifice and 
definite service on the part of every single individual, so that 
call has been sounding forth in China — as also in other coun- 
tries — that every Christian church member should be en- 
listed and prepared to take some definite, regular and per- 
manent part in the great work of spreading the Gospel 
amongst all classes of people. This remains the leading idea 
of the present report — the call for regular and continuous 
universal service, and the spiritual preparation for an ade- 
quate response to this call. — "China Mission Year Book," 
1917, p. 338. 

The churches of Canada and the United States 
should not be less ready than the Church in China to 
sound this note of individual responsibility so that 
every Christian in its membership cannot fail to hear. 
In colleges where only part of the student body has 



184 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

carried any sense of missionary responsibility, the aim 
now should be to bring this conviction home to every 
Christian man and woman on the campus. The vvrorld 
enterprise of the Church must be backed by the in- 
telligent conscience of its entire membership. 

5. Intercession must be mobilized. Our nations 
have not hesitated to do this. People of all creeds are 
called upon to pray for Divine guidance to be given 
their rulers, for the welfare and safekeeping of the 
soldiers and the sailors, and for victory to rest upon 
the arms of the Allies. The clergy, Protestant, Ro- 
man Catholic and Jewish, are regarded by the Govern- 
ments as immensely useful agents in enlisting the in- 
tercession of all believing people in their congrega- 
tions. 

The Church must be mobilized to pray for precisely 
the same things in her world campaign. She must 
marshal the intercessions of her membership that 
Divine guidance may be given the men and women 
who hold the responsibility for developing and exe- 
cuting her missionary policies, and whose sense of 
burden and strain they have been all too hesitant to 
disclose; that the missionaries of the Cross may be 
preserved in health and may be sustained in their 
loneliness and deprivations and difficulties; that vic- 
tory may be given to the enterprise in the winning 
of multitudes to the Christian faith, in the guiding 
and dynamizing of the Church in the mission field and 
in the penetrating of the spirit of Jesus into the whole 
life of non-Christian nations. 

How slow we are to grasp the fact that without 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 185 

superhuman leverage the missionary load will never 
be lifted. Jesus recognized this and counselled His fol- 
lowers to rest their confidence in prayer. It was indeed 
the only missionary method He proposed. "Pray ye 
therefore the Lord of the harvest." He did not need 
to caution us not to neglect conferences and commit- 
tees and movements and special campaigns, for He 
knew that the human mind would be ready enough 
to devise these agencies. But "He knew what was 
in man," and recognized that in our self-sufficiency 
we would be liable to neglect the one essential factor. 
How tragic is our error in that we multiply and per- 
fect these other methods and give relatively little time 
or attention to the spreading and deepening of the 
habit of missionary intercession. Of what value will 
these other methods be which we have just been con- 
sidering apart from prayer? Intelligence, for exam- 
ple. Missionary intelligence that does not lead to 
prayer can have little value; indeed, all our added 
knowledge, if it does not move us to carry on our 
hearts before the throne of God the problems it has 
uncovered to us, will prove a peril. The giving of 
money will not be very liberal, or enthusiastic, or sus- 
tained, nor will it be productive of reflex benefits to the 
giver or freighted with the empowering blessing of 
God, if it is not coupled with missionary intercession. 
The organization of the enterprise, however perfect 
mechanically, will be only mechanical and dead unless 
it is energized by the dynamic of prayer. 

How may we develop this supremely important fac- 
tor in the missionary enterprise? In colleges and 



186 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

theological seminaries prayer for missions might be 
developed in chapel services, in the meetings of the 
Christian organizations in the institution, in Mission 
Study classes and also in small groups that could be 
gathered in dormitories or fraternity houses for this 
express purpose. The Cycle of Prayer of the Stu- 
dent Volunteer Movement might be much more 
widely and intelligently used. Pastors might make 
prayer for the missionary work of the Church a more 
prominent element in congregational worship. At fre- 
quent intervals, they might turn the midweek prayer 
meeting into a gathering for missionary prayer, bring- 
ing to the attention of the Christians present, some 
immediate needs of the enterprise as revealed by re- 
ports from the Mission Board rooms, the latest issues 
of missionary periodicals or a letter from some mis- 
sionary, and devoting the meeting largely to united 
prayer with reference to those needs. 

But the great potency of missionary intercession is 
developed in the individual prayer life of Christian 
men and women. Each of us must enter more fully 
into his own inheritance of obligation and privilege 
and power by becoming an effective prayer agent. 
The importance of this should be brought home con- 
vincingly to each Christian student in the college, each 
individual member of the congregation. In this con- 
nection wide use should be made of effective literature 
on the subject, such as^ the pamphlets "Intercessors: 
The Primary Need," by Dr. John R. Mott and 
"Prayer and Missions," by Dr. Robert E. Speer. 
Without question the supreme need of the hour in the 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 187 

world campaign of the Church is the mobilization of 
her prayer resources. The key to the power house 
is in the hands of the people of God. "He can do it 
if we will." 

Along such lines, the Church of Jesus Christ may 
mobilize the full strength of her resources and so rise 
to the heights of a great international emergency both 
of opportunity and of need. 

III. The World Campaign of the Church Deserves 
the Full Mobilization of Christian Strength. 

1. Because of the dimensions of the undertaking 
and its manifold difficulties. The resources that are 
in the hands of the Church's membership should be 
requisitioned on a scale that is commensurate with a 
world undertaking. Those Christians who have ac- 
cepted a responsibility for Christianizing conditions 
across the seas should realize the inadequacy of the 
old scale to accomplish so immense and arduous a 
task and those who have never recognized any such 
responsibility should be enlisted in a convinced and 
whole-hearted participation in the missionary program 
of the Church. In view of its vast proportions the 
undertaking demands a marshalling of the forces no 
less sweeping than this. 

It should be repeated that this is not a question of 
calling aside the energies and gifts and prayers of 
Christians from responsibilities nearer home. A man 
is not asked to be a poor father when he is asked to 
become a good neighbor, nor is it assumed that he will 
be a less helpful neighbor when he is urged to under- 



188 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

take large civic or national responsibilities. The 
clearer recognition he has of his national obligation, 
the more useful he will be to his community, and if 
a new spirit of kindliness and serviceableness in his 
community relationships possesses his life he becomes 
a better husband and father. By the same token the 
man who perceives clearly his obligations for the wel- 
fare of individuals and societies at the other end of 
the world has a keen discernment of his obligations 
to his own nation and immediate community. The 
greatest challenge that can be set before Christian 
discipleship today is the task of taking the Christian 
message and the Christian spirit to all parts of the 
world into which they have not yet entered. If a wide- 
spread response will come to that challenge there will 
be a new access of Christian energy for the other un- 
dertakings of the Church. 

2. Because of its urgency. Our nations would not 
have been justified in the wholesale mobilization of 
their resources, if the full strength of those resources 
were not needed at once. The necessity of mobilizing 
the full strength of Christianity for its world cam- 
paign is also an immediate necessity. The utmost 
that the Church is able and competent to do at any one 
time is the measure of what she should do now. The 
opportunities of the hour cannot wait to be seized. 
The present needs of the lands without Christ cannot 
wait to be met. The present generation of non- 
Christians cannot wait to be evangelized. For our 
own souls' sake we who have Christ now cannot wait 
to share Him with others. And must Christ wait to 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 189 

"see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied?" A 
new hour has struck in the unfolding of the Divine 
purpose for mankind, and it is an imperative sum- 
mons to the entire membership and the full energy of 
the Church. 

We cannot for a moment allow the War to inter- 
fere with the most liberal plans for enlargement of 
our missionary activities or to interrupt our undertak- 
ings even during the years of disturbance. The Lon- 
don Times recently deprecated any disposition to re- 
trench the foreign missionary work of the Church or 
to postpone its expansion. 

The prudent policy for an army hard pressed is to shorten 
its Hnes. It may be assumed that the Church is hard pressed, 
both in men and in material; its wisdom, therefore, would 
appear to lie in a bold shortening of the lines. . . . But the 
Church with one voice has rejected this logic. . . . The un- 
pardonable sin for a modern man is to despair of the human 
family, or to demand a safety for himself or his people which 
is not offered to all. We are not saved, it has been well 
said, except in a saved race. 

The Church, believing, as it must do, that in its Gospel there 
is a sure spiritual foundation for mankind, cannot limit its 
vision or its service. Nor can it do its work piecemeal; it 
cannot finish its task in Europe and afterwards begin in 
Asia. "Throughout Asia there is in process a complete 
transformation of social institutions, habits, standards and 
beliefs. The movement is unceasing; it will as little wait 
on our convenience as the tides of the sea." The Church 
indeed, so far from thinking that the missionary enterprise 
can be delayed, is stricken by remorse to know that it is late, 
almost too late, with the offer of a faith to which all the 
spiritual strivings of the East have moved. . . . There has 
now come to the seers a vision of nations accepting as a 



V 

190 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

basis of their life the spiritual values of the Gospel. They 
read the missionary enterprise in terms of the statesmanship 
which alone can be tolerated in the coming age, the states- 
manship which thinks internationally and takes into its range 
the whole world. The vision glows before the Church of 
the day when nations shall come to the Light, and kings to 
the brightness of His appearing. 

The Prime Minister of Canada, Sir Robert L. Bor- 
den, maintains that this is no time for retrenchment, 
but rather for expansions of missionary work. "I am 
convinced," he says, "that never has there been a 
greater responsibility laid both upon the Church gen- 
erally and upon the various missionary movements 
than at the present time. The task which will con- 
front these bodies, especially during the period fol- 
lowing the war, will be a tremendous one; but I am 
convinced that they will welcome it rather as an op- 
portunity, and that every effort will be made not mere- 
ly to sustain the record of past years, but to make 
such an advance as will meet in some adequate meas- 
ure the crying need of stricken humanity for those 
ministrations which it is the duty and the privilege of 
the Church to offer." 

President Wilson voices a similar conviction. He 
says: 'T think it would be a real misfortune, a 
misfortune of lasting consequence, if the missionary 
program for the world should be interrupted. . . . 
I for one hope that there may be no slackening or re- 
cession of any sort." 

3. Because of the aim in view. The hearty re- 
sponse with which all classes of the people have met 
the efforts of our nations to mobilize their full strength 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 191 

has been due not so much to the colossal proportions 
and immense difficulties of the undertaking as to the 
high quality of the end in view. So in the world un- 
dertaking of the Church, the claims of its majestic pur- 
pose carry a stronger appeal than the claims of its 
large dimensions and difficult problems. 

If the Canadian and American nations can call 
forth so enthusiastic and widespread a public com- 
mitment to the cause for which they fight, may the 
Church not expect a similar response throughout her 
membership in behalf of the cause of her world cam- 
paign? And after all do the aims not run on parallel 
lines ? And do they not make their appeal to the same 
qualities of mind and heart ? The man who puts every- 
thing of himself into the campaign to give the Chris- 
tian message to the whole world is the sort of man 
who will put all that he has into the present War for 
righteousness and liberty throughout the world. Stu- 
dent Volunteers for foreign missions in the colleges 
have been the readiest, in Britain, in Canada and in 
the United States, to volunteer for military service. 
The sons of missionaries have enlisted in large num- 
bers.^ Conversely, may we not expect that men whose 
answer is so ready to the call of the nation have an 
answer ready to the call of the world campaign of 
the Kingdom of God? 

We have altogether underrated the forces that 
might have been marshalled to so great a cause as the 

1 According to The Presbyterian Record, January, 1918, 
every son of a Canadian Presbyterian missionary who is of 
fighting age has enlisted. 



192 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

world program of Christianity. If the true nature 
of that cause is brought before the Christian college 
men and women of today, and a ringing call made for 
volunteers to go out to the frontiers of the Kingdom, 
there should be such a response on the part of able 
and devoted students as will crowd the ranks of the 
Foreign Missionary Legion of the Christian Church 
and keep it up to full strength. 

The same is true of the supporting constituency. 
The battlefields tell no more stirring tales of heroism 
than the communities from which the soldiers have 
come. How many of the service flags that hang in 
our windows could tell of hearts within that are ach- 
ing but that rejoice in the privilege of sacrifice. 
When word came to Portsmouth that one of its boats 
had been torpedoed and had gone down with all hands, 
the wives of the seamen hid their tears and sang 
together the National Anthem of England. After a 
costly Zeppelin raid on East London, the women from 
that part of the city begged Parliament not to with- 
draw one airplane from the front in order to 
strengthen the home defences. M. Jusserand, the 
French Ambassador at Washington, in speaking at a 
dinner in New York on February 6, 1917, told of the 
peasants in Brittany who, when the tolling of church 
bells announced the outbreak of war, went up into 
their steeples and changed the tolling into joyous 
carols. Up and down the cities and villages of Can- 
ada there is that rugged, heroic, self-sacrificing spirit 
that will give to the limit and then give more for a 
Cause that to them^ is glorious and commanding 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 193 

This other Cause, is it less glorious and command- 
ing? Should we not expect from others and demand 
from ourselves in behalf of that Cause as lavish an 
offering of treasure and of life? A tithe of the sac- 
rifice that is so cheerfully made in Canada and the 
United States for the aims of the War would go 
far to realize the aims of the foreign undertakings of 
the Church. 

4. Because of its rewarding character. The War 
not only has uncovered splendid deposits of loy- 
alty, heroism, chivalry, resourcefulness, determina- 
tion, patience and sacrificial unselfishness, it has also 
highly developed these qualities. There have been 
many apostles of the value of war in awakening and 
cultivating the resources of the human spirit. "One 
of the prime dangers of civilization," said Colonel 
Roosevelt a few years ago, "has always been its ten- 
dency to cause the loss of the virile fighting virtues, of 
the fighting edge." The irony of it is that he ad- 
dressed these words to an audience in Berlin. Evi- 
dently his remarks were heeded. But the truth of his 
words has been more than demonstrated by the pres- 
ent War which has developed not only qualities of 
virility and ruggedness but, in many at least, the finer 
qualities of compassion, kindliness, forbearance and 
sacrifice. It has taught many lessons, such as economy 
and self-discipline which we needed to learn. It has 
brought to the surface our finest national ideals. It has 
put a new quality into our patriotism and fused us into 
a new national unity. It has broadened our outlook, 
sharpened our perceptions, brought us closer to real- 



194 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

ity, given us a truer standard of values. So it has 
been in Great Britain. Mr. Lloyd George in his 
famous Queen's Hall speech on September 19, 1914, 
said of the effects of the War even at that early date : 

It is bringing a new outlook for all classes. The great 
flood of luxury and sloth which had submerged the land isl 
receding, and a new Britain is appearing. . . . iWe have been 
living in a sheltered valley for generations. We have been 
too comfortable and too indulgent, many, perhaps, too selfish, 
and the stern hand of fate has scourged us to an elevation 
where we can see the great everlasting things that matter 
for a nation — the great peaks we had forgotten, of Honour, 
Duty, Patriotism, and, clad in glittering white, the great pin- 
nacle of Sacrifice pointing like a rugged finger to Heaven. 

For these most useful awakenings and developments 
in the individual human spirit and in our corporate life 
we need something like a war. 

Something like a war. But not war itself. It exacts 
too much of us and awakens too much within us that 
would better be left dormant. A "moral equivalent for 
war" is Professor William James' familiar phrase. 
And in the missionary undertaking of the Church we 
have just that, an equivalent in all its helpful phases, 
but with none of its wasting or degrading aspects. 
It is rewarding because it brings into play and de- 
velops every splendid quality that is exercised or ex- 
panded by war. Its value to increase capacity, round 
out character and develop personality is part of the 
experience of a multitude of men and women. It 
is rewarding because of the satisfactions which it 
brings. There is an exhilaration in spending one's 
self in a Cause so worthy. Into this Cause we can 



FULL MOBILIZATION OF CHRISTIAN FORCES 195 

pour the full voltage of our energy, the full measure 
of our days and of our devotion and know that noth- 
ing is wasted. The supreme glory of sacrifice is 
reached only when the Cause is supremely glorious. 
Read the words^ of Sir Robert Falconer, President 
of the University of Toronto, as though they related 
not to the War but to the missionary crusade of the 
Church, "Men die, the Cause lives. . . . We are no 
company of footsore slaves, but disciplined crusaders 
on behalf of an imperishable cause," and we lift them 
to a yet nobler truth. But the great reward for every 
man is the inner commendation of his course, the en- 
nobling sense of a duty done regardless of the cost. 
How rich is that reward for the man who throws 
his life with abandon into this campaign for the re- 
demption of men and the enthronement of Christ 
throughout the world. 

The task to which we are called in behalf of the 
non-Christian world is one that fully satisfies and 
abundantly rewards. Everything good that War can 
do, this crusade of love can do, has done and is now 
doing for congregations and colleges and also for 
countless men and women who have made it their su- 
preme business and their controlling passion. 

This is, the Call of a World Task in War Time. 
We speak of it as the call of a task, of an emergency, 
of a need. But, after all, is it not the call of Christ? 
In the present call of the nation, the call of liberty, 
the call of humanity, many a man and woman has 
recognized His clear imperative. More sharply still 

iln his Convocation address, September, 1917. 



196 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

in this other campaign, through all the voices that cry- 
out for prompt and effective and sweeping measures 
by the Church for the redemption of mankind, we 
should distinguish His voice of entreaty and cctfrtmand. 
"Back to Christ'* men often tell us. He is not be- 
hind us, but ahead. Our duty is to follow, to come 
close after Him. In this undertaking they do not also 
serve who only stcmd and wait. It is His will that we 
should move forward. 

The Call is distinctly individual. If we are near 
enough to catch His voice at all, it comes to each of 
us as a piercingly personal call. No one is excused. 
No one can shift his separate responsibility upon the 
shoulders of another. Will any of us be found slack- 
ing in the day of God's power ? Let us each earnestly 
counsel with himself, "If every Christian were to an- 
swer the call with my degree of loyalty and devotion, 
would Christ be satisfied, would He be vindicated and 
enthroned in all the earth, would His message and His 
spirit sweep across the nations and meet the utmost 
needs of humanity? The world task of the Church 
is my world task." 



QUESTIONS FOR THOUGHT AND 
DISCUSSION 

For discussion in groups only a few questions should be 
used. They should be carefully selected and given out in 
advance. 

Chapter I 

What seem to you to be the seeds from which this war 
has grown? What things other than war are the 
fruits of such seeds? 

Are any such seeds or such fruits to be found on your 
college campus? In your home town? In your nation? 

On what grounds has it been contended that the Golden 
Rule is not practicable between nations? What is 
your own opinion and how do you defend it? 

What is the most convincing evidence of the lack of 
reality in the Christianity of Anglo-Saxons and Amer- 
icans — national sins, wrong international attitudes, the 
survival of war or the spirit of hate? 

Does it seem to you inevitable that the soldier should 
have hatred toward his enemy in his heart? Can a 
nation or an individual wage war with genuine love 
and goodwill toward the enemy? What is the testi- 
mony of this war on this point? 

Would our hands be weakened in war if all hate were 
taken out of our souls? How is the spirit of hate be- 
ing developed? How may we offset this spirit? 

What are the most striking arguments you could make 
to prove that Christianity is not "played out" or im- 
potent? Could you argue that it now appears to be 
more potent than ever? 
197 



198 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

Do you believe that war can be destroyed by the in- 
crease of education, of science, of commerce, of law? 
What are the reasons for your belief? Wherein, in 
your opinion, does the hope of the ultimate destruc- 
tion of war lie? Why? 

Do you think that Qiristian principles, if they had been 
allowed free play in Christian lives, would have pre- 
vented the present war? What principles? 

What seem to you to be the main obstacles to reality in 
religion? How can such obstacles be overcome? Does 
the strongest demand for religious reality today come 
from individual, national or international life? 

Do you think that an American or Canadian can be an en- 
thusiastic and active advocate of war in the present 
instance and justify himself as a man of peace? Why 
or why not? 

What seem to you the surest tests of the reality of a 
person's religion? Of a nation's? 

What are the characteristics of a universal religion? 

Is the religion of your campus worth sending to the stu- 
dents of other lands? Is your religion, the one you 
live, worth shariijig with others? 

Would the religion Jesus Christ lived solve the world's 
problem? Would there be war if all men lived the 
religion He lived? Would there be hatred if His prin- 
ciples governed the relations between classes and be- 
tween nations? 

Of the reasons which the war has brought out for the 
immediate propagation of our faith among the nations, 
which appeals to you as the strongest? Why? 

In what way would you show that foreign missions are 
the constructive counterpart of the war we are now 
carrying on? 

What does history show about the vitality of a religion 
that is not shared? 



QUESTIONS FOR THOUGHT AND DISCUSSION 199 

Chapter II 

What aspects of Christianity are today most in need of 
vindication ? 

Draft an outline for an address which, if you were a 
leader of the native church in China, you would make 
to persuade your non-Christian countrymen that Chris- 
tianity has not failed. 

Up to what point would victory for the Allies carry 
humanity in the establishment of a truly Christian in- 
ternational order? Can an internationalized world be 
the final outcome of the war unless it first exists in 
the hearts of men and women? 

On what evils does provincialism rest? What is the cure 
for it? 

Do you agree with the statement that "no one can hence- 
forth be called educated whose study has not been done 
in an atmosphere of world interest?" How many peo- 
ple do you know, or know of, who really think inter- 
nationally ? 

How can we change people's thinking and make it inter- 
national rather than provincial? What responsibility 
does it seem to you rests upon students to lead in in- 
ternational thinking? 

Do you agree with the college professor who recently 
said that no man or woman would be fit for the polit- 
ical duties of a citizen in IQ-IO who knew nothing of 
missions? 

What is distinctive in the national ambitions of Canada? 
Of the United States? What is the besetting sin of 
nationalism in these nations? 

What elements may nationalism righly preserve as the 
spirit of Christian internationalism develops? How is 
a nation to learn the lesson of self-mastery? 



200 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

In what ways may globe trotters and non-missionary 
Westerners residing in the cities of the Orient 
strengthen the hands of the missionary? How would 
you summarize the white peril in Africa? 

How does the factory legislation of your state or prov- 
ince compare with that of Japan? To what extent do 
you think the conditions existing in the industrial 
plants of your nation will affect those of the East? 

How can the world, which commerce, travel, education, 
improved means of communication, etc., have made a 
neighborhood, be transformed into a brotherhood? 

What is your opinion of the Oriental exclusion laws of 
Canada? Of the United States? What would seem 
to you a fair method of regulating immigration, one 
which would be worthy of an internationalized world? 

If you were an Oriental student, who knew nothing of 
Christianity and Christian civilization save what you 
learned of them on your campus, what would be your 
estimate of them? 

How may an attitude of friendliness be shown to the 
Orientals and Latin Americans who are studying in 
the United States and Canada? To what wholesome 
elements, in our national life should we seek to expose 
them? 

What contacts between the West and the East other 
than those mentioned in the chapter should be Chris- 
tianized ? 

In your judgment, wherein lies the closest connection be- 
tween world missions and world peace? 

What is the greatest danger that threatens the back- 
wash of Eastern influence upon the West? 

How may the "yellow peril" be turned into a "golden 
opportunity" ? 

What seems to you the greatest single reason demanding 
that we give our most earnest and immediate attention 
to the Christianizing of all our impacts upon other 
peoples? Would you place Christian missions first 
among these impacts? Why? 



QUESTIONS FOR THOUGHT AND DISCUSSION 201 
Chapter III 

Of the new difficulties which the war has created in mis- 
sionary work, which seems to you the most serious? 
Why? 

In what respects may these several difficulties prove to 
be advantages? 

In what ways and by what means is the war likely to 
affect caste in India? 

What social customs and ideas are now undergoing trans- 
formation in Islam? 

What aspects of the modern life of Japan are now in a 
plastic condition? 

How would you express the religious idea at the heart of 
democracy? What connection have Christian missions 
with the spread of democracy in the earth? 

What modem problems common to the nations of the 
East find no adequate solution in their traditional 
faiths? 

What missionary opportunity do you see in the present 
collapse of Islam's political power? 

If you were a missionary, what advantage would you 
take of the sharp distinction that the war has revealed 
between essential Christianity and the attitudes and 
practices of conventional Christianity in the West? 

Impersonate an Indian soldier on his return from France 
telling an audience in his home village of the friend- 
liness shown to him by Christians during the war. 

How do you account for the increased vitality of the 
Church in the mission field during the years of the 
war? How may that vitality be conserved? 

Which is more significant for the future of Christianity 
in the Orient, the mass movement in India or the turn- 
ing to Christ of the educated classes in China? Why? 
(This question may take the form of a debate. Ma- 
terial may be found in Bishop Oldham's "India, Ma- 
laysia and the Philippines," Chap. V, and G. S. Eddy's 
"Students of Asia," Chap. IV, also in recent files of 
missionary periodicals.) 



202 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

CHAPTER IV 

How can the splendid sympathies and generosity which the 
sufferings of the War have roused be conserved after 
the War is over? 

What are some of the lessons which the West may learn 
from the East? 

In what ways are the peoples of non-Christian lands suffer- 
ing because of the War? 

Are there any sufferings akin to these in the non-Christian, 
nations when there is no War? 

How do you explain the fact that such sufferings have 
always existed in non-Christian nations, and that we have 
not done more to relieve them? 

In what ways is the War likely to increase the needs of non- 
Christian peoples? 

What do you consider the greatest single cause of the pov- 
erty in the non-Christian world? 

What has religion to do with meeting the problems of pov- 
erty, disease and degradation? 

What have the religions and customs of non-Christian lands 
done to children? 

Which do you think is the most heartbreaking, the sorrow 
of the English widow or that of the widow of India? 
Why? 

Where does the deepest degradation of womanhood appear 
in non-Christian lands? Why do you think so? 



QUESTIONS FOR THOUGHT AND DISCUSSION 203 

What is distinctive in Christianity regarding the honoring 
of womanhood? 

What need in non-Christian nations is making today the 
most urgent appeal for relief? 

How would Jesus* view of the worth of the individual and 
of social responsibility compare with that of the non- 
Christian religions? (See E. D. Soper's "The Faiths of 
Mankind.") 

What is it that makes it possible for you to bear sorrow 
without despair? 

What difference would it make to you to have to meet great 
suffering without that? 

If you were going out as a foreign missionary, what aspect 
of the world's present need would you hope primarily 
to reheve? 

Write a brief summary of what Christian Missions are 
now doing, apart from the direct preaching of the Gos- 
pel, to meet the needs of the non-Christian nations. 

In what ways can we help to lessen the pain of the people 
of non-Christian countries? 

CHAPTER V 

How would you define the aims of the War? 

How would you define the aims of the foreign missionary 
movement ? 

What do you think would be the effect on the bringing to 
pass of the new and righteous world for which our 
armies fight, if we should lessen our work on the mission 
field because we were at war? 

What answer would you give to a person who said that he 
thought the work of Christian missions should be re- 
trenched during wartime? 



204 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

What would you say to one who said that while Jie did not 
believe in retrenchment he felt that we should not attempt 
to do more than keep up existing missionary work until 
after the War? 

What attitude have Great Britain and Canada taken toward! 
their missionary work during this War? 

How do you account for the missionary awakenings which 
so often have occurred in times of national disturbance 
and disaster? 

What signs have you observed of a similar awakening in 
the Protestant Churches of North America during the 
present war period? 

What demands will such an awakening make upon the col- 
leges, universities and theological seminaries? How may 
these institutions help to create a missionary uprising in 
the Church today? 

What seems to you the greatest singfle thing which will 
create and maintain a permanent world peace? 

What relation has the missionary enterprise to this? 

How nearly did the early Christians come to giving the 
Gospel to the entire world in their day? (See C. R. 
Watson, "God's Plan of World Redemption," pp. 121, 
124-125, 141-152.) How do you account for the rapid 
spread of Christianity in that era? 

Is it correct to say that it must be God's intention that 
some generation should complete the evangelization of 
the world and that until the contrary is proven through 
the effort, we should reckon that ours is the generation 
to do it? Why or why not? 

In your judgment, what factors in the present world sit- 
uation present the strongest appeal for an immediate 
program of reaching the whole of humanity with the 
Gospel ? 



QUESTIONS FOR THOUGHT AND DISCUSSION 205 

In what respects is the world more open to the Christian 

message than it ever was before? 
What lessons may we learn from the spread of Islam in 

Africa? 
What is the most useful equipment for her world task that 

the Church has gained from her missionary experience? 

Why do you think so? 
How would you answer one who objected to the project of 

carrying the Christian message into all the world on the 

ground that it would be too costly in men and money? 
When would you consider that a nation could be called 

"evangelized" ? 

Have we greater or less reason to hold to the Watchword 

today than Christian students had when it was adopted? 

Why? 
How does the acceptance of the Watchword as a personal 

challenge and purpose enrich one's Ufe? What can each 

one of us do for its realization? 



CHAPTER VI 

How would you attempt to awaken a missionary interest in 
a Christian to whom the world aspects of Christianity 
had not yet appealed? 

How do you account for, the lack of missionary interest in 

so many Christians? 
What arguments would you use in trying to induce a friend 

to join a group for the study and discussion of the world 

problems of the Christian religion? 
By what methods might missionary intelligence be developed 

in your college? Church? 
What constitute powers of leadership? Write a letter to a 

busy but efficient Christian asking him, or her, to take 

the chairmanship of a missionary committee. 



206 THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 

What constitutes an adequate program of missionary giving? 

In what ways can the nation's method of mobilizing man 
power be dupHcated in the world campaign of the church? 

How do you think a large expansion of foreign missionary 
work would affect the work in behalf of home needs? 

What, in your judgment, constitutes a missionary call? 
How did the call come to any missionaries of whom you 
know? 

Is a student justified in volunteering for foreign missionary 
service if at present his Board has more applicants than 
it can send? 

What do you consider the indispensable qualifications for a 
successful missionary? 

How can prayer for missions be systematized without be- 
coming mechanical? 

What expansion would you look for within the life of one 
who became earnest and conscientious in prayer for the 
world enterprise of the church? 

What appears to you the strongest reason for a thorough 
mobilization of the church for her world campaign? 
Why? 

How would you show that the foreign missionary under- 
taking furnishes a moral equivalent for war? 

What would it involve for you if you should commit your- 
self fully to the world program of Christ? 



QUESTIONS FOR THOUGHT AND DISCUSSION 207 

SUGGESTIONS FOR AUXILIARY READING 

Since the course is concerned with movements and develop- 
ments of the hour, the best reference material must be sought 
in periodicals, especially The Missionary Review of the World, 
and in pamphlets and reports published by Foreign Mission 
Boards. 

Some of the best books for auxiliary reading are the fol- 
lowing : 

G. S. Eddy— The Students of Asia. 

G. S. Eddy — With Our Soldiers in France. 

W. P. Faunce — Social Aspects of Foreign Missions. 

H. E. Fosdick — The Challenge of the Present Crisis. 

Sidney L. Gulick — America and the Orient. 

[E. T. Igl chart, Editor] — The Christian Movement in the 

Japanese Empire. 
[E. C. Lobenstine, Editor] — China Mission Year Book. 
Frederick Lynch — President Wilson and the Moral Aims 

of the War. 
[Chas. S. Macfarland, Editor]— The Churches of Christ 

in Time of War. 
[F. B. Macnutt, Editor] — The Church in the Furnace. 
[Basil Mathews, Editor] — Christ and the World at War. 
J. R. Mott— The Present World Situation. 
J. R, Mott — The Decisive Hour of Christian Missions. 
J. R. Mott — The Evangelization of the World in this Gen- 
eration. 
J. H. Oldham— The World and the Gospel. 
J. P. Smyth— God and the War. 
R. E. Speer— The Christian Man, the Church and the 

War. 
H. F. Ward and R. H. Edwards— Christianizing Commu- 
nity Life. 



APPENDIX A 

SOME PRAYERS FOR USE IN WARTIME 

A PRAYER FOR WORLD FRIENDSHIP 
By Harry Emerson Fosdick 

Father of all nations, endue us with vision, and courage, 
and resource in Thee, that the crisis of the world may become 
the opportunity of* the Kingdom. Guide our country, em- 
power our churches, inspire and restrain ourselves and all 
men that righteousness may triumph. For wisdom to discern 
the means most profitable to abiding peace and international 
concord, for leaders to point the way and for multitudes to 
follow them, till all nations are one fraternity, we pray to 
Thee. Make real the brotherhood of man, O God, and 
glorify our race in a fellowship of friendly peoples. O Lord, 
crucified afresh by the sin of the world, after this Calvary, 
grant us, we beseech Thee, an Easter Day and a triumphant 
Christ. 

A PRAYER IN TIME OF WAR 
By Isaac Ogden Rankin 

Lord of Hosts, in whose hands are all the counsels and 
events of earth, in this hour of our nation's trial we appeal 
to Thee. In war and battle may we always be the instru- 
ments of Thy judgment and Thy righteousness. Grant us 
deliverance from disaster, and, if it please Thee, glorious 
and enduring victory. Bless especially with grace and wis- 
dom Thy servant, the President of the United States, the 
commander of our armies. Preserve our ships upon the sea 

208 ^ 



QUESTIONS FOR THOUGHT AND DISCUSSION 209 

and our soldiers on the shore. Purify our nation's hearts 
from pride and cruelty and our lips from boasting. Let us 
not go forth to battle as those who are greedy of gain or 
honor, not in hatred or in love of strife, but in desire of 
justice and as helpers of the weak. In all experiences through 
which Thou makest us to pass may the assurance of Thy 
rule in the affairs of men be our confidence and consolation. 
Remember the wounded and the sick and those who are 
appointed to die, and make them sharers of Thy kingdom. 
Strengthen us for all endurance, and especially sustain and 
comfort those who mourn for the dead. Deny us not Thy 
swift decision in mercy both to us and to our enemies. And 
may the coming of Thy kingdom bring all cruelties and 
jealousies, all strife and hatred, to a speedy and eternal end, 
through Jesus Qirist our Lord. Amen. 

A PRAYER FOR USE OF STUDENTS IN WARTIME 
By Edward I. Bosworth 

Almighty God, Father of all mankind, have mercy on us. 
Forgive us that hitherto we have not looked with humihty, 
self-sacrifice and devotion upon the lot of those less favored 
than ourselves in our own and other lands. We now feel 
the stern, loving pressure of Thy will upon us. Therefore, 
we pray Thee, purify our souls and fit them for the times 
and tasks that face us. 

We offer ourselves and all that we have to Thee, to be 
used in life and death to bring a larger life to all men of 
every race. May those of us who are called to take up arms 
in the battle for a better world be everywhere true followers 
of Jesus Christ. In camp may our hearts be kept pure and 
the Gospel word be often on our lips. In the fierceness of 
fighting may we be quiet and unafraid. May those of us who 
will die in battle find the Lord of life with us in the death 
hour. May those of us who will bring our brothers to death 
do the deed without hate, eager to meet them again, some 
time and somewhere to do the will of God together. 



210 APPENDIX 

Grant to those who minister in hospitals power to bring 
not only healing to the bodies but peace to the souls of the 
sick and wounded far from home. 

Give patience to all who in suspense wait and pray at home 
and fortify their souls for whatever message may come. 

Give peace to the nations in Thine own time, O God. 

In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, the Savior of the 
world. Amen. 

A PRAYER FOR OUR ENEMIES 
By Charles Gore, Bishop of Oxford 

Give Thy Blessing, O Father, to the people of that great 
and fair land, with whose rulers we are at war. Strengthen 
the hands of the wise and just, who follow charity and look 
for justice and freedom, among us as among them. Drive 
away the evil passions of hatred, suspicion and the fever of 
war, among us as among them. Relieve and comfort the 
anxious, the bereaved, the sick and tormented, and all the 
pale hosts of sufferers, among us as among them. Reward 
the patient industry, loving-kindness and simplicity of the 
common people and all the men of good heart, among us as 
among them. Forgive the cruelty, the ambition, the foolish 
pride, the heartless scheme, of which the world rulers have 
been guilty. Teach us everywhere to repent and to amend. 
Help us so to use our present afflictions which come from us 
and not from Thee, that we may build on the ruins of our 
evil past, a firm and lasting peace. Grant that, united in a 
good understanding, with these who are now become our 
enemies, though they are our brethren in Christ, they and 
we may establish a new order, wherein the nations may live 
together in trust and fellowship, in the emulation of great 
achievements and the rivalry of good deeds, truthful, honest 
and just in our dealing one with another, and following in all 
things the standard of the Son of Man whom we have de- 
nied and put to shame, and crucified afresh upon the Cal- 
vary of OU4- battleground. Amen. 



THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 211 

PRAYER FOR THE UNITY OF GOD'S PEOPLE 

O God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, our only 
Saviour, the Prince of Peace; Give us grace seriously to lay 
to heart the great dangers we are in by our unhappy divisions. 
Take away all hatred and prejudice, and whatsoever else may 
hinder us from godly union and concord: that as there is 
but one Body and one Spirit, and one hope of our calling, 
one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of 
us all, so we may be all of one heart and of one soul, united 
in one holy bond of truth and peace, of faith and charity, and 
may with one mind and one mouth glorify Thee; through 
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen, 



APPENDIX B 

THE CHALLENGE OF THE WAR TO 
FOREIGN MISSIONS 

The church at home and abroad is confronted by a chal- 
lenge and an opportunity never exceeded. Some are coun- 
selling hesitation and even the curtailment of effort and 
offerings, upon the plea that the state should now command 
all the resources of men and of money. 

Representing the mission organizations and forces of North 
America, the Committee of Reference and Counsel, through 
its officers, hereby appeals to the Christian missionary organ- 
izations and constituencies of America as well as to every 
individual disciple of Jesus Christ. 

We recognize that the spirit of patriotism, calling for 
supreme sacrifice in the interest of righteousness and of 
country, must not be discouraged and that the cry of dis- 
tressed humanity cannot be ignored. While some Missionary 
Boards are not contemplating special and untried undertak- 
ings or planning the erection of buildings not immediately 
necessary, we cannot escape from the conviction that this 
period of war, with all its exacting demands, may be the 
supreme hour for undertaking new and daring enterprises for 
Christ and the church. 

We would call attention anew to the significant fact that 
the large missionary enterprises had their origin in times 
of the greatest national and international upheavals. The 
missionary societies of Great Britain were launched while 
Europe was rent asunder by the Napoleonic Wars and the 
first missionaries sent abroad from the United States began 

212 



THE CALL OF A WORLD TASK 213 

their work during the War of 1812. At the time of the 
American Civil War new foreign missionary organizations 
sprang into being and the old Boards experienced signal 
expansion. In the history of the church, widespread disorder 
and physical suffering and need have incited to greater devo- 
tion and sacrifice. 

We are also face to face with the startling fact that the 
work of more than 2,000 Teuton missionaries has become 
disrupted and is in danger of dissolution whereby some 
700,000 followers of Christ in pagan lands may be left as 
sheep without a shepherd. This throws an immediate and 
enormous responsibility upon the Christians of England and 
North America to conserve the devotion and sacrifice which 
German missionaries have given to building up Christian 
communities and institutions. England is heroically assum- 
ing a large share of the burden; we of America must not 
hold back. 

The Asiatic and African races are undergoing sweeping 
transformations in their thinking, their relations to the 
nations of the West, and in their religious conceptions. 
They have been fighting the white man's war shoulder to 
shoulder with Europeans and upon a plane of equality. De- 
pendent peoples who are now sharing in this conflict cannot 
return to former positions of contented subjection. 

China and Japan have held the balance of power in East- 
em Asia, constituting a new and significant relation to the 
Western nations. Already the Far East is seething with a 
new national and international life for which she is seeking 
a substantial religious foundation. 

These conditions demand, while the situation is plastic, 
the concentration of the unifying forces of Christendom. 
Today the great majority of these people are more accessible, 
and even more eager for Christian instruction, than they 
have ever been before in all the history of modem missions. 
These conditions cannot be expected indefinitely to continue. 

The foreign missionaries, with their prestige, their insti- 
tutions already established, and with their message of com- 



214 APPENDIX 

fort, hope and regeneration, hold a position unique in history 
and pregnant with assurances of universal international good 
order and brotherhood and permanent peace for the world. 
Foreign missionaries can now render a genuine patriotic and 
national service, both to the country from which they come 
and the country in which they serve. Thoughtful people 
have come to realize, what men eminent in statecraft are 
beginning to affirm, that foreign missions have been an ef- 
fective force for breaking down barriers between East and 
West. It is clear that foreign missionaries are true soldiers 
of the better order which is to bind the world together after 
the war. They are quite as important to America as her 
army or her navy. By serving the world most effectively they 
also greatly serve the state. 

We therefore call upon all who love their country, who long 
and pray for universal brotherhood and for an abiding peace 
among nations, who hope to see the principles taught by 
Jesus Christ become the principles underlying all human 
society and ruling the national life of the world, to regard 
no effort too exhausting and no sacrifice too great for the 
fullest vitalization of all missionary agencies and for the 
completest possible mobilization of the forces of the Christian 
church for the redemption of the world. 

To this end we implore sincere prayer and united inter- 
cession coupled with unstinted sacrificial giving. 

On behalf of the Committee of Reference and Counsel. 

James L. Barton, 
Chairman, 
Wm. I. Chamberlain, 

V ice-Chairman, 
George Heber Jones, 
Secretary. 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: nuj 2001 

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